Playwright: Migdalia Cruz. At: Collaboration and Teatro Vista at the Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn. Tickets: 312-443-3800; www.GoodmanTheatre.org; $18-$30. Runs through: Aug. 9. Photo by Saverio Truglia
On her wedding day Lulu gazes at herself in her white dress. “It erases everything you are,” she tells herself as she looks back over the previous 23 years. Jumping back in time, we see little girl Lulu sharing stories with her older brother, who protected her from their abusive father. Eventually, he killed the old man—somehow getting away with the crime—and then murdered 18 other men before ending up on Death Row and dying of AIDS. Consistently, Jesus (later called Papo) battered his victims’ faces to a bloody pulp and then—like a Harry Potter dementor—sucked their dying breaths with a kiss. By contrast, Lulu’s upwardly mobile path embraced an education and a loving man who is able to weather Lulu’s occasional eruptions of rage, a residual of her early life.
The “grito” of the title means “cry” and—to mix languages if not metaphors—El Grito del Bronx is a cri du coeur—a cry from the heart—from Latina playwright Migdalia Cruz who applies the most poetic sensibilities and language to this tale of emotional and physical violence. The scenes of Jesus/Papo in prison are beautiful and tender as Cruz extends the story-telling motif—established between brother and sister as children—throughout the play.
This world-premiere production is a creative partnership between Collaboraction and Teatro Vista theater companies in which Collaboraction’s intensely physical style and Teatro Vista’s poetic bent blend powerfully under Anthony Moseley’s direction. As the adult siblings, Sandra Delgado and Juan Villa are charismatic and intense, Villa barely concealing the threat of his physical power (both as actor and character) and Delgado never quite suppressing Lulus’ sublimated pain. They are supported by a fine ensemble, and an impressive design team which has provided a two-level scenic design that is literal yet suggestive, and large but never overwhelming.
All that good stuff having been said, this is a new play in its first production and Cruz still has some work to do on the script. The play is about Jesus/Papo and what makes him tick—Lulu wants to know how her gentle brother could kill 18 men—but the crucial piece is missing. The leap from killing one’s abusive father to turning mass murderer is not automatic or obvious. Cruz hints at racial aspects—Papo kills only white men, Lulu is subjected to stereotyping—but she doesn’t fully explore this (which is just as well) nor make the racial connection for Papo. Several key characters—Lulu’s sympathetic Jewish lover and Papo’s cellmate—are not fully formed and so lack dimension (even as effectively performed by Josh Odor and Warren Levon), while several minor characters might be cut completely.
El Grito del Bronx is complex and theatrically rich—a work of rough poetry well worth continued attention and work.