Radio Golf at Penumbra Theatre on 10/11/09
By: Susan Sink
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While Gem of the Ocean and King Hedley II, the two plays Wilson wrote before this one, were bogged down by long monologues and somewhat confusing and overwrought in general, Radio Golf has a clear moral dilemma at its center and compelling, likeable characters to take us through the plot. The acting is, as always at Penumbra Theatre, top notch, and the ensemble of James Craven, Austene Van, Kevin West, Abdul Salaam El Razzac and Terry Belamy fully and naturally inhabit their characters and enjoy Wilson’s language as they execute a complex dance onstage, choreographed by artistic director Lou Bellamy.
The play revolves around Harmond Wilks (James Craven), who is running to become the first black mayor of Pittsburgh in 1997, and also operates the Bedford Hills Redevelopment Office. He is following in his father’s footsteps (another major theme of Wilson’s work is father-son relationships) as a privileged real estate agent, though he is a better man than his father, working to revitalize the Hill neighborhood. He is attracting federal money for a large apartment complex, and already has Whole Foods, Starbuck’s, and Barnes and Noble lined up for the retail spaces, and a medical complex attached that he wants to name after the first African American nurse in Pittsburgh. Of course, there will be personal gain, but he also cares about the neighborhood. He celebrates when it is declared “blighted,” because that is how they will secure the funding, but he also wants to move back to the neighborhood—against the wishes of his ambitious wife Mame (Austene Van).
His partner, Roosevelt Hicks (Kevin West), is younger, more ambitious, and mostly interested in personal gain, not community welfare. The difference between the two men is seen in their choice of posters for their office wall: Martin Luther King Jr. for Wilks and Tiger Woods for Hicks. However, they are not in conflict, until two neighborhood characters wander into the office and expose a problem with the development plan. It is clear what “the right thing” is to do in this situation, but not clear whether Wilks and Hicks will do it. That moral dilemma is what fuels the play.
What is lovely about this play for those who like Wilson’s work is the way it works out his two sources of moral test. On the one hand, there is a clear-cut case of legal corruption, which privilege makes a non-issue but personal character keeps at the forefront. On the other hand, there is the question of history, particularly the history of the black community in that neighborhood and Wilks’ own complex genealogical history, tugging on him to do the “right” thing based on race and culture. All of the main characters, though flawed, are not so deeply flawed as Troy Maxson in Fences or so strident as Boy Willie in The Piano Lesson or King Hedley II.
Radio Golf runs at Penumbra Theatre through Oct. 25. More info at penumbratheatre.org.
Location Info:
Penumbra Theatre
Artist Info: Penumbra Theatre
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