The Motherfucker with the Hat
Knockdown Dragout Productions
8 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 27 – Saturday, Aug. 29
Actors Warehouse Studio | Oklahoma City
Going to the theater is much like mining for diamonds: You slog through a lot of muck before finding that rare gem, often in unexpected places. A case in point is The Motherfucker with the Hat by Stephen Adly Guirgis, now at Actors Warehouse Studio. Although not a great play, Motherfucker, as we’ll call it following the practice of shortening the title after first reference, is a rollicking soap opera with compelling plot twists and soaring dialog.
The play is presented by Knockdown Dragout Productions, a new venture by Lance Garrett and Emily Etherton, the husband-and-wife team behind the bygone Ghostlight Theatre Club. They are devoted to staging provocative, edgy theater, and goodness knows we need more of that around here.
Garrett directs the production, and it succeeds on Guirgis’s strong script and terrific performances by the cast. The play depicts a few days in the lives of ethnically diverse, working-class denizens of New York City, who struggle to eke out a living. Actually, some of their entrepreneurial spirit deserves admiration. But drug addiction and prison time are understood to be regular parts of life.
Todd Clark (giving the performance of this life) leads the cast as Jackie, an ex-con (he served 26 months in prison) who celebrates landing a job as an apartment building porter as if it’s the best thing that ever happened to him — and it probably is. Clark embodies the character with every cell of his being each moment he’s on stage. When Jackie’s berated — and he’s berated a lot, as well as doing his own berating — Clark withers or shows defiance with equal skill. Some of his best work is done when he’s reacting to other characters. Clark gives an extraordinary performance in a role that offers copious opportunities to be outstanding.
Cristela Carrizales (excellent, per usual) plays Jackie’s girlfriend, Veronica, a cocaine-snorting hairdresser who makes one wonder how she keeps a job. Carrizales employs the full range of her prodigious acting talent here. Veronica is a disturbed person, and Carrizales both rails and pleads with the manipulative skill of an addict.
As Jackie’s slightly epicene cousin, Julio, Morgan Brown (excellent, both poignant and hilarious) mugs at times, but he gives a thoughtful performance. In one of his best scenes, Julio recounts the first time he and Jackie smoked pot together when they were 11 or 12 years old.
Kendon Lacy plays Jackie’s rehab “sponsor,” Ralph D., and Emily Etherton is Ralph’s wife. These roles are slightly subordinate to Jackie and Veronica, but Lacy and Etherton give fine performances.
Any play titled something like The Motherfucker with the Hat will employ, let us say, piquant language; this play isn’t for the squeamish. Example: Veronica, when accused by Jackie of infidelity: “I didn’t fuck nobody. Jackie, you know how I am. You know I’m a little fuckin’ crazy just like you’re a little fuckin’ crazy, and you know I’d rather spit on a nun’s cunt than give a fuckin’ inch when I been wronged. I been wronged here.” You get the idea.
This is a production on a budget. A few pieces of homely furniture represent several locations in New York City. But as the play goes on and Guirgis’s script and the cast’s performances display their fine qualities, audience members fill in details with their imaginations.
Knockdown Dragout aims to challenge audiences (Ghostlight’s first production was Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman). In more ways than one, they picked a good play to do that in Motherfucker.
