The Color Purple

The Color Purple has been well-reviewed all over the place, and I generally agree that it is a strong production of a moving show. But I have a serious ax to grind.

In Alice Walker's novel The Color Purple, the protagonist Celie, who has been breathtakingly mistreated from birth, comes to life when she becomes lovers with the vibrant Shug. Shug helps Celie reclaim herself--and introduces her to what her body can do. She teaches Celie about her "button" and its magic orgasmic powers.

So, silly me, when I saw that the song list included "Push da Button," I happily anticipated a lovely lesbian love/sex song.

And instead got a song teaching women how to please their men!!!!

In this version of The Color Purple, Celie and Shug's relationship is underplayed almost to invisibility. While the heterosexual couples bump and grind, Celie and Shug hug. While Harpo and Sophia's relationship is highlighted, Celie and Shug's is lowlighted. It's truly infuriating!

When John Doyle famously pared The Color Purple to what the New York Times calls "its essence," he missed its soul.

Wendy Caster
(P14; tdf ticket)

Spring roundup: Head of Passes, Bright Star, The Color Purple, Kvelertak

 

It's been a hellishly busy couple of weeks, but I've managed to see a few shows nonetheless. In the interest of time, I'll spare you my typically long-winded reviews in favor of terser ones. Here goes:

Head of Passes, by Tarell Alvin McCraney, is a modern retelling of the Job story. Set in Head of Passes, Mississippi, the action takes place in the formerly grand home of Shelah, who has a birthday approaching, a recently diagnosed illness she's dreading telling her friends and three children about, and property so badly in need of repair that it's raining as hard in her living room as it is out in the yard. The play itself, which has apparently been reworked since it ran at Steppenwolf in 2013, still occasionally misses the mark: some of the characters are not as developed as they might be, and a few of the plot points introduced early on don't gain much steam. But even if the show were perfect, there's really no way to prepare for the absolutely thrilling ass-whooping Phylicia Rashad gives the audience late in the second act.

Joan Marcus

I know it sounds like a cliche--as does the old "I had to remind myself to breathe"--but hell if Rashad doesn't tear the roof off in this tour de force performance. Being that this is a Job story, I don't think it gives much away to tell you that Shelah shoulders a whole lot of bad news in the second act. Driving the surviving characters away in a heartbroken rage, she stands in the rubble of her ruined house (yet another cliche: the set, by GW Mercier, is worth the price of admission), and the final stretch of the show has her alone, railing for a good half hour at a God she is at once furious with and wholly devoted to. While I've always appreciated Rashad, I admit I never knew she had the depth and range that she exhibits here. She makes mincemeat of a monologue that has her crying, cackling, thundering, raging and rejoicing on a dime. Hers is one of the finest--and possibly most exhausting--performances taking place nightly on a New York stage right now. Head of Passes has been extended, for good reason--see it before it closes, if you can swing it.