Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current, January 22, 2020, Page 11, Image 11

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    January 22, 2020
Page 11
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In Celebration of our 30th year Church Anniversary
Sunday January 26, 2020, at 3:30pm
Rev. Dr. R.H.Edwards, Sr. Pastor
d avid k inder /C ourtesy i Mago t heater
Victor Mack (left) and La’Tevin Alexander star in ‘Sweat,’ a
Pulitzer-Prize winning play that gives insight to the struggles of
workers who fall into despair when they lose their jobs in the face
of industrial decline.
photo by
Humanity Shines
in ‘Sweat’
C ontinued froM p age 6
Cynthia begins to wonder if she
was chosen for the management
job so that she could absorb just
this sort of blame, even while the
agency to impose these decisions
actually resides with company
leaders who don’t engage with line
workers at all. And none of them
notice that Oscar (Chris Ramirez),
the American-born son of Colom-
bian parents who cleans up after
them at the bar, can’t break into
the union no matter how hard he
tries.
As the world of the union work-
ers begins to crumble, we see how
easily they can be pitted against
each other. Their anger and pow-
erlessness quickly becomes anger
at one another; with no agency
and no access to the real decision
makers, they blame each other for
betrayals that are varying degrees
of real and imagined. Yet their
humanity shines through even
in their worst moments; they are
good people struggling against
extreme pressure. Their anger and
fear is understandable and, even
when their responses to one an-
other are far from heroic.
Under Acebo’s direction, this
production puts us in proximi-
ty to folks for whom options are
far more limited than most of us
sitting in theater seats have imag-
ined; the characters go from being
able to save for a very nice vaca-
tion to working multiple menial
jobs in order to pay the rent in a
slum or falling into addiction or
homelessness. The uniformly ex-
cellent cast (which also includes
Victor Mack as Cynthia’s husband
and Chris’s father, Brucie, who
lost his union job more than a year
before the other characters and is a
living prophecy of what lies ahead
for all) portrays these characters
with complexity and humani-
ty, and conveys a sense of how
quickly and cataclysmically their
worlds are shifting--showing up
to work to find that the machines
have been sold; lockouts that last
for endless months; contract offers
involving paycuts as high as 60
percent; the pressures that lead a
person to cross a union picket line.
In the end, the characters--like
so many Americans in the face of
industrial decline--turn on each
other because that is the only di-
rection they can find to focus their
anger. They have, to varying de-
grees, believed in the American
dream of prosperity, and when
that dream crumbles, they blame
who they have been primed to
blame: whoever is beneath them
in the hierarchy. The actions of
those who really decide what hap-
pens are protected from scrutiny.
Profile Theater’s production
of “Sweat” plays through Feb. 2
at Imago Theater, 17 S.E. Eighth
Ave.
Darleen Ortega is a judge on
the Oregon Court of Appeals and
the  first  woman  of  color  to  serve 
in that capacity. Her movie and
theater review column Opinion-
ated Judge appears regularly in
The Portland Observer. Find her
review blog at opinionatedjudge.
blogspot.com.
True Vine
Missionary
Baptist Church
4735 N. Commercial Ave. Portland, Or 97217
503-335-3085
Theme: A Church that operates by faith in Jesus Christ.
Hebrew 11:1, 6
Guest Evangelist: Supt. Roy Tate, Sr. Pastor
Christ Memorial Christian Church, Portland, Or.
YOU CALL, WE HAUL
C annon ’ s r ib e xpress
3625 NE MLK Jr Blvd,
Portland OR
Call to Order: 503-288-3836
Cannon’s, tasty food and
friendly neighborhood
atmosphere.
Open (hours)
Mon-Sat: 11am-7pm
Sunday: 11am- 6pm
Closed Tuesday
Johnny Huff
(owner/operator)
Scrapping Metal
& Landscape Meintenance
Cell: (971) 263-5516
Avalon Flowers
520 SW 3rd Ave., Portland,
OR 97204 • 503-796-9250
Cori Stewart--
A  full service flower experience
• Birthdays • Anniversaries
• Funerals • Weddings
Owner, Operator
Open: Mon.-Fri. 7:30am til 5:30pm
Saturday 9am til 2pm.
Website: avalonflowerspdx.com
email: avalonflowers@msn.com
We Offer Wire Services
Theotis Cason
503-287-0855
5015 NE MLK Blvd.
Portland, OR 97211
Catering Available