Page 8
February 26, 2020
Exploring Life at the Margins
C ontinued froM P age 2
what they and their teachers often experi-
ence as a war zone. Her own son, Omari (La’
Tevin Alexander), isn’t a student there, how-
ever, she and her ex-husband have sought to
improve his prospects by enrolling him in
a private prep school. At the opening of the
play, Omari has been suspended for striking
a teacher, throwing mother and son into a
tailspin. What pressures are closing in on
Omari, even inside his more privileged con-
text? The play illuminates how the stresses
and trauma that black families experience
are not entirely economic, at least not in the
ways we would think of, so much as cultural
and even spiritual--how one is confined by
what others expect to see. The pipeline isn’t
only to prison; it’s to an imprisoned identity.
This sensitive production is buoyed by
strong performances, especially by its two
leads. La’Tevin Alexander embodies Om-
ari’s sense of confinement; the options his
parents have attempted to give him thrust
him into a world where he is tokenized,
where he is expected to receive opportu-
nities with gratitude and subservience. In
many ways, his good mind intensifies the
pressure; the anger and inquisitiveness of
a young black man is met not with space
s hawnte s iMs /
P ortland P layhouse
La’Tevin Alexander and Reggie Lee
Wilson illuminate aspects of the school-
to-prison pipeline in “Pipeline.”
and understanding but with an impulse to
break him.
Ramona Lisa Alexander conveys the an-
guish of a good woman attempting to use
the tools at her disposal, as is her prosper-
ous ex-husband Xavier (Reggie Lee Wil-
son). With all the best intentions, these two
have attempted to do everything right, to
protect their son from the pressures that
are supposed to be the “problem” for black
children. Yet despite their efforts, their son
is still in trouble, and they are alienated
from each other and, to some degree, from
him. This thoughtful production of Moris-
seau’s insightful play, beautifully direct-
ed by Damaris Webb, illuminates Audre
Lorde’s observation that the master’s tools
will never dismantle the master’s house.
What Omari needs--and what his parents
need--require more than resources and ed-
ucation; this play opens space for love and
curiosity about that something more.
Profile Theater, in partnership with Art-
ists Repertory Theater, continues its explo-
ration of the work of Paula Vogel with a pro-
duction of “Indecent.” This beautiful play,
originally commissioned as part of Oregon
Shakespeare Festival’s American Revolu-
tions project, also grapples with questions
of identity and pressures to attain respect-
ability at the expense of authenticity.
Vogel struck gold with an important
and little-known piece of theater history,
the trajectory of “The God of Vengeance,”
a play written in Yiddish in 1906 by Pol-
ish-Jewish writer Sholem Asch. That play
about a Jewish brothel owner and a for-
mer prostitute who seek respectability for
themselves and their daughter, Rifkele,
feels far ahead of its time--but the story of
the play’s trajectory through Europe and,
eventually, to an obscenity trial that ham-
pered its 1923 Broadway production, is
endlessly illuminating.
What originally made the play contro-
versial was its focus on unsavory char-
acters and its treatment of the Torah; in a
time of virulent anti-Semitism, a story of a
brothel owner with a complicated relation-
ship to Judaism and any idea of redemp-
tion seemed dangerous. Asch sought to tell
the truth rather than to focus on stories that
would more obviously support his belea-
guered community’s quest for acceptance;
compromised characters exist in every
community, and their stories are important
and illuminating.
But at the center of Asch’s play is a love
story between two women, Rifkele and
Manke, one of the prostitutes in the brothel
run by Rifkele’s parents. As “Indecent” il-
luminates, love in the midst of oppression
Photo by
Courtesy
spoke to audiences--and yet the love story
became the wedge that led to the obsceni-
ty trial (driven by the efforts of a rabbi to
shut down the play). The dominant culture
would not have shut down “The God of
Vengeance” for its treatment of the Torah
and its depiction of moral compromise,
but its fear and judgment of a love story
between two women could be enlisted to
hinder production of a play that did not
portray who American Jews wanted to be
in the world. Eventually Asch himself,
heartbroken by oppression of Jews that
culminated in the Holocaust, banned fur-
ther productions of it.
“Indecent” becomes a compelling rumi-
nation on this history. In this gentle pro-
duction, we experience the actors as ghosts
of the many artists who found hope in the
play itself; they carry the history of a piece
of art that challenged even its own creator,
who wrote it as an idealistic youth and then
neglected to protect it from efforts to turn
it from a story of love to one of judgment.
The actors and stage manager, caretak-
ers of the play, are inspired by it and also
struggle against their own ambitions and
desires for acceptance. Eventually, artists
struggling for survival in the Polish ghetto
during Nazi occupation stage regular read-
ings of a play that has been such a source
of hope for the Yiddish community.
The Portland production, beautifully
directed by Profile’s artistic director Josh
Hecht, benefits from especially resonant
design choices; we see how the play and
k athleen k elly /
P rofile t heater
Michael Mendelson in the heart-opening
play “Indecent.”
Photo by
Courtesy
the many artists who loved it and created it
lived inside shifts in culture and time. And
as with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival
production I saw earlier this year, chore-
ography and three on-stage musicians hold
the soul of this play, revealing essential
components of Yiddish culture in move-
ment and the sounds of accordion, clarinet
and violin.
Written by visionary women, both these
plays offer heart-opening journeys that are
worth making time for. “Pipeline” plays at
Portland Playhouse through March 15, and
“Indecent” plays at Portland State Univer-
sity’s Lincoln Hall through March 8.
Darleen Ortega is a judge on the Ore-
gon Court of Appeals and the first woman
of color to serve in that capacity. Her mov-
ie and theater review column Opinionated
Judge appears regularly in The Portland
Observer.