Violence and Its Aftermath

Cardboard Piano – TimeLine Theatre Company

In small church in northern Uganda, as New Year’s Eve ushers in the new millennium, two young girls prepare to celebrate by secretly exchanging marriage vows in a faux wedding ceremony. Chris is the rebellious daughter of strict, conservative missionary parents; Adiel is a feisty, but romantic African teenager, who’s smitten with her. Their lesbian love, not to mention an unheard of racial relationship, are both taboo and strictly forbidden in Uganda. The couple’s secret union will culminate in a night of sexual romance, before they flee from this repressed country to a city where being gay doesn’t mean persecution and punishment. However, as might be expected, their idyll is about to be violently interrupted.

Into the church bursts a young man named Pika, a boy soldier who’s somehow managed to escape from the violent, oppressive army who kidnapped him and forced him into service. He’s been severely injured and is covered in blood, but the girls, after being threatened, provide first aid. What transpires, following this act of kindness, is horrific and brings the first act of this powerfully brutal drama to a shocking close.

The second act is in the same locale, but fourteen years later. The church as been beautifully renovated from the last time we saw it. Also, in a fascinating casting choice, three of the four actors play different people, with someone from Act I portrayed here as an older, perhaps wiser character. Chris’ authoritarian father has passed away and she’s brought his ashes to be buried in the church garden. But, as in the first act, dramatic responses erupt regarding Chris’ past and her lifestyle, with some additional surprising revelations from two of the other characters. It’s an explosive conclusion to a moving play of violence and its aftermath.

Mechelle Moe’s staging of this new play by Hansol Jung is dynamic and gritty. She pulls no punches, nor shies away from anger or the passions of Jung’s characters. Her production emphasizes the sad irony of how Christians profess to be about love and forgiveness, but often vehemently deny members of the LGBT community this right. Played upon Jeffrey D. Kmiec’s stunning scenic design, the audience becomes a fly on the wall, with a closeness seldom achieved in other productions of this acclaimed Humana Festival offering. Great credit goes to Elle Erickson’s authentic-looking costumes, Brandon Wardell’s heavenly lighting design and, especially, excellent dialect work by Eva Breneman.

Moe’s quartet of actors is strong. Kearstyn Keller is superb playing Chris, both as a young teenager and again fourteen years later. She evolves into an older, but wiser young woman who works hard to achieve forgiveness for a past of trauma and destruction. Adia Alli is equally terrific, playing Chris’ young African lover, Adiel, and later as Ruth, the life-loving, passionate new paster’s wife. A promising young actor from the Chicago High School for the Arts, Freedom Martin makes his TimeLine debut, breaking the audience’s heart as Pika, the escaped child soldier, and as Francis, a young gay Ugandan parishioner who’s been banished from the church for not being heterosexual. In each of these two roles Martin plays characters who’ve been displaced and are searching for acceptance and safety. Kai A. Ealy has the most challenging roles, playing a savage, inhumane soldier, in the first act, and an older Pika, now the pastor of the church in which he sought shelter as a boy. Pika’s turned into a man driven by a religious mission, but filled with anger and a buried grudge. These four actors work well together, seamlessly mining every ounce of emotion from their characters, while making this tale of trauma and its survivors a living, breathing moment from history.

Highly Recommended

Reviewed by Colin Douglas     

Presented January 9-March 17 by TimeLine Theatre Company, 615 W. Wellington Ave., Chicago.

Tickets are available at the box office, by calling 773-281-8463 x6 or by going to www.timelinetheatre.com

Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.