stage Before there were docu-dramas or historical fictions, there were Shakespeare’s histories—just enough fact to make a good story believable and a believable story great. Playwright Carlyle Brown takes the origin of America’s first black theater company and twists it wonderfully into a history within a history and a play within a play for Culbreth Theatre’s production of The African Company Presents Richard III.
Successfully producing Shakespeare’s Richard III in 1821 New York, the black company, which exposes “the emperor’s new clothes” issues in the motives of Richard and Lady Anne, discovers that success can draw the ire of the establishment—notably Stephen Price (Joel Grothe), owner of New York’s Park Theater, who is opening with a renowned English actor in the part of Richard.
Price conspires to close the African Company with the help of a dimwitted but determined Irish-American police constable (played delightfully by Sam Rabinovitz), while the African cast explores merging art and humanity into a new culture. Lead actor Jimmy Hewlett (Todd Patterson) struggles with both the concept of love and the Booker T. Washington conflict inherent in attempting to assimilate.
While Patterson shines in his brilliant and disturbing conversion from “Hamlet” to a minstrel performer in the second act, he needs the aide of Papa Shakespeare’s (Keith Morgan) superb translations of love’s signals to overcome male pride and recognize housemaid Annie’s desires. In her role as Annie, Lauren Collins is first overshadowed by Rhavynn Drummer’s rambunctious Sarah, but ultimately sparkles as she morphs into a fiery, black Lady Anne.
With inventive lighting (designer R. Lee Kennedy often literally puts the spot on the audience) and costumes (Papa Shakespeare’s Jamaican field hand is especially intriguing) the play’s only technical flaw is, at times, overbearing sound. Like a sitcom laugh track, the heavy-handed music sometimes battles Brown’s written subtlety and Theresa Davis’ insightful directing.