By Chuck Graham, TucsonStage.com
Arizona Theatre Company
The Arizona Theatre Company's stage has always had a welcoming spot for jazz, blues and country music. Now ATC's artistic director Sean Daniels brings our theatrical pop culture experience up to date with a play reading of “The Realness,” presented online in the COVID-prompted virtual format.
Described as a work in progress and originally sub-titled “a break beat play,” playwright Idris Goodwin takes us straight into the hip-hop heart of young T.O. (Terrell Donnell Sledge), a New York teen who grew up living for the true-grit ideals of the rapper's lifestyle.
The twist is, T.O. comes from wealthy black parents who raised him in a comfortable white suburb. He also has a trust fund...much to T.O.'s own chagrin.
We are in the school year 1996-97, and this congenial lad identifies with the hard core gangster sounds of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G.
The deaths of Tupac and B.I.G. become show-stoppers during the play, forcing T.O. to re-see with new eyes his own chosen lifestyle.
Two women play strong roles in “The Realness.” The street-wise Prima (Analisa Velez) is beginning to attract attention on the ambitious amateur level among the city's hip-hop artists. She dreams of getting signed to her own record deal, to become just like her vaguely-defined boyfriend Lord Style (Marcus John), who thinks of himself as being a few rungs higher up the ladder.
Professor Brown (Moya Angela) is the iron-willed college journalism teacher who pushes T.O. to keep looking deeper, searching for his true self, and his own music, instead of letting the music that's already popular define him.
Completing the cast is Hector Flores, Jr. playing several smaller roles. The most touching is Ray, another eager teen. Ray has a severe stuttering problem, except when he starts rapping. Then he becomes a giant.
“The Realness” is being polished into a gem with many facets. It isn't about the music, exactly, or the struggle to be heard, exactly, or to need to identify oneself, exactly. All those elements are in this swirl of competing ideas, grasping like so many hands to reach a different way out.
Goodwin the playwright isn't about to start picking winners and losers among them. Prima still won't let her heart rule her head and T.O. is more than happy to lie, cheat, steal and do whatever else it takes to have Prima for his own.
All the while, Prof. Brown is toiling in the background, believing her job is to create and graduate an entirely new generation of young black people cable of shaping their own talents, breaking free of limitations others put on them.
Each of the people we meet has a defining scene and a different story. The play might not change your opinion of hip-hop, but your view of life's future possibilities will surely broaden.
While the virtual format online is limiting, the production by this cast brings value to ATC's reputation. No tickets are necessary to watch “The Realness.” Donations are appreciated to help keep the doughty theater company moving into 2021.
Go to arizonatheatre.org and follow the prompts. “The Realness” will be available online until 5 p.m. Nov. 22.
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