This play adds the 1980s to August Wilson's immense project of dramatically chronicling the African-American experience of the 20th century, decade by decade. Brian Stokes Mitchell, coming from his Tony-winning performance in the musical comedy Kiss Me Kate , now has a shaved head and viciously scarred face, and he never never never lets us glimpse that dazzling smile. Men rob, steal, con each other and themselves, seek murderous revenge for petty affronts to their pathetic pride.
Women suffer, abide, connive and grow desperate.
It's a story already so familiar that, without particularity, the characters and their motives become tediously generic. King's wife, Tonya, played brilliantly by Viola Davis, is the only character who sounds human and genuine and not like somebody who talks in scripted dialogue. The impressive set of crumbling brick houses silhouetted against a night sky was designed by David Gallo. And if you think his speech is odd, Richardson's fake French accent veers from Irish to American to Garble-Gallic. As directed by the playwright, the hour and a half is filled with realistic awkward silences and long pauses while people fetch things from other rooms.