Jeremy O. Harris’ “Slave Play,” which opened Sunday at Off Broadway’s New York Theatre Workshop, is a giant trigger warning in three acts. This is an ambitious, at times uneven satire about race and sex and power and politics that seems designed to provoke.
It begins with the surprisingly graphic onstage couplings of three interracial couples on an antebellum Virginia plantation. A white overseer named Jim (Paul Alexander Nolan) hooks up with a broom-wielding slave named Kaneisha (Teyonah Parris, “If Beale Street Could Talk”) — though not before forcing her to eat cantaloupe off the floor. A white mistress (Annie McNamara) orders an educated mixed-race slave, Phillip (Sullivan Jones), to play the violin before penetrating him with a dildo. And a black overseer (Ato Blankson-Wood) brings himself to orgasm when he makes a white indentured servant (James Cusati-Moyer) lick his boots.
But since we first meet Keneisha twerking to Rihanna’s “Work” and Phillip picks out an R. Kelly tune on his fiddle, things are not quite what they seem. Indeed, Harris — a student at Yale Drama School who has two shows opening Off Broadway this season — has a very big twist up his sleeve. (No spoilers here.)
Harris’ intentions become clearer in the middle section of his three-act, intermissionless play, with the introduction of two modern-day academics-cum-therapists (Chalia La Tour and Irene Sofia Lucio) who use terms like “heteropatriarchal” and “positionality” in an attempt to help people to “process” their feelings.
That processing does not seem to go well for anyone, including the well-intentioned therapists themselves who seek to impose in-vogue theory on the messy reality of American race relations. Nor does it bolster the white (or paler) people, who seem surprised to get no credit for good intentions.
“You’re the virus,” one character tells them at one point, recalling the decimation of indigenous peoples by the arrival of Europeans to the American continent. “Your mere presence was biological warfare.”
“Slave Play” can be saggy; each of the three acts would benefit from some trimming. And the third act, which reunites one of the couples in an encounter that is both intimate and humiliatingly raw, seems more designed to shock than illuminate.
At no point do we believe that these are flesh-and-blood humans who might have chosen to be together in a relationship; they seem more like props — or in this case, agitprops — for Harris’ provocative message about the dreadful state of race relations, which seems to have hobbled everyone, white and black.
In Harris’ view, patterns of oppression have become so ingrained that even African Americans fail to recognize its footprints — even when they are clearly marked on their backs. “Slave Play” recalls the work of Thomas Bradley and Robert O’Hara (who directs this production, sometimes too broadly) and it announces the arrival of a bold and challenging new voice in theater.
Broadway's 12 Top-Grossing Non-Musical Plays of All Time, From 'War Horse' to 'Harry Potter' (Photos)
Broadway isn't just for musicals. Here are the all-time top-grossing straight plays on the Great White Way, according to grosses compiled by the Broadway League up to March 8, 2020. (These figures aren't adjusted for inflation, so recent hits at current sky-high ticket prices have a definite advantage.)
12. "700 Sundays" (2004-05; 2013-14)
Total gross: $32,029,177
Billy Crystal's autobiographical one-man show found favor in two separate runs on Broadway nearly a decade apart.
Photo: Carol Rosegg
11. "Betrayal" (2019)
Total gross: $32,621,468
Tom Hiddleston, Charlie Cox and Zawe Ashton packed 'em in for the fourth Broadway production of Harold Pinter's time-bending drama.
10. "August: Osage County" (2007-09)
Total gross: $32,835,606
Tracy Letts' Pulitzer-winning drama became a huge hit on stage without any big stars -- and then a 2013 movie starring with Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts.
9. "Proof" (2000-03)
Total gross: $32,896,994
David Auburn's drama about a woman with a troubled legacy of both mental illness and genius-level math skills earned multiple Tony Awards, including for star Mary-Louise Parker.
8. "The Play That Goes Wrong" (2017-19)
Total gross: $34,341,708
This farce about an amateur theater company's mishap-prone production of a mystery play is another London import that found popularity on this side of the Atlantic.
7. "God of Carnage" (2009-10)
Total gross: $37,345,584
Yasmina Reza's barnstorming dramedy about two dueling couples earned the Tony for Best Drama -- as well as nominations for James Gandolfini, Jeff Daniels, Marcia Gay Harden and Hope Davis.
6. "It's Only a Play" (2014-15)
Total gross: $37,500,966
Terrence McNally's backstage comedy was a huge hit thanks to the Broadway reteaming of Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane, stars of the Tony-winning musical "The Producers" a decade before.
5. "Angels in America" (2018 revival)
Total gross: $40,937,028
The 2018 revival of Tony Kushner's two-part epic won three Tony Awards, including for co-stars Andrew Garfield and Nathan Lane.
4. "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" (2014-16)
Total gross: $68,321,435
Another London import, Simon Stephens' adaptation of Mark Haddon's YA novel follows an autistic boy on a quest for the killer of his neighbor's dog.
Photo: Joan Marcus
3. "War Horse" (2011-13)
Total gross: $74,975,253
Michael Morpurgo's YA novel about a British boy's search for his horse in World War I inspired both this epic play, complete with life-size puppets, and Steven Spielberg's 2011 film.
2. "To Kill a Mockingbird" (2018 - )
Total gross: $120,211,443* (as of March 8, 2020)
Aaron Sorkin's adaptation of the beloved Harper Lee novel may have been snubbed by Tony nominators for Best Play, but it has been drawing crowds since opening in December 2018.
1. "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Parts One and Two" (2018 - )
Total gross: $174,056,581* (as of March 8, 2020)
The stage sequel to J.K. Rowling's saga about the now-grown boy wizard has extra advantages -- since it's a two-night (and two-ticket) epic that plays in a musical-sized auditorium to diehard Potterheads.
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You don’t need an orchestra — or songs — to draw audiences
Broadway isn't just for musicals. Here are the all-time top-grossing straight plays on the Great White Way, according to grosses compiled by the Broadway League up to March 8, 2020. (These figures aren't adjusted for inflation, so recent hits at current sky-high ticket prices have a definite advantage.)