by Dr. Tiffany Raymond, PhD
City Theatre presents James Ijames’ 2022 Pulitzer Prize winning play, “Fat Ham”, a loose adaptation of “Hamlet”.
Just as “Hamlet” opens with a question, “Who is there?,” Ijames echoes with an interrogative starter. Juicy (Brandon Foxworth) asks his best friend, Tio (Jordan Williams), “Are you watching porn?” Director Monteze Freeland (also co-artistic director of City Theatre) has Juicy’s voice heighten and nearly crack with incredulity. From sentence one, this is unequivocally a modern Hamlet. However, this question also anchors the play. The porn that plays out is not just on Tio’s phone but the suggestion of impropriety with the rapid marriage of Juicy’s mom to his uncle following his father’s death.
The play is set in a Maryland backyard at a BBQ celebrating the nuptials of Juicy’s mom, Tedra (Maria Becoates-Bey) to his uncle Rev (Khalil Kain). Kain also plays the ghost of Juicy’s father, Pap, linking the brothers as two sides of the same coin. The correlation is cemented when Pap’s ghost confesses to Juicy that Rev took out a hit on Pap in prison where he was serving out a sentence for murder.
In this world, neither man is an innocent. However, Pap still wants Juicy to exact revenge on his uncle/stepdad. Tio points out the cycle of incarceration in Juicy’s lineage when Juicy shares the ghost’s request. Juicy’s family history mirrors the history of black America where nationally, black men are incarcerated at nearly 10 times the rate of white men. When Pap makes his ghostly appearance, he pops out of a wheeled, lidded garbage can, and the symbolic overtones of a man most think of as trash are overt.
At the party, Tedra karaokes a ravishing version of Whitney Houston’s “I’m Every Woman” for her new husband. She leans back and shimmies down the wall of the house, oozing sensuality. Like Houston, Tedra is also a battered woman. Becoates-Bey exudes the fevered hope of this second chance marriage being the one, even while she senses it’s not. She actualizes the undercurrent of pain caused by betrayal from those closest to you when she repeats how Juicy’s dad “used to hit me in the titty.”
Juicy follows his mom’s steamy mic drop with the equally symbolic as he sings Radiohead’s “Creep.” Foxworth captures the song’s depressive feel in a vocal performance that doesn’t deviate from flat monotonality. The lyrics of “I’m a creep / I’m a weirdo” correlate to his outsider status as a queer black man seeking his place in a world outside of the incarceration model of his ancestry.
As it turns out, Juicy isn’t the only outsider. The play broadly explores the ways in which familial expectations shape us. Juicy’s friends, Larry (LaTrea Rembert) and Opal (Elexa Lindsay Hammer) battle their own demons regarding the discrepancy between stereotypical gendered expectations from their mother, Rabby (Linda Haston) that are at odds with who they are and want to be. The familial trio of Rembert, Hammer and Haston all shine. The play’s casting is impeccable. Rabby is proud her son is a Marine, and she wants Opal to pursue a stereotypically feminine career trajectory in HR or marketing. Who our family wants us to be versus who we are is the play’s central tension.
Scenic designer Sasha Schwartz leans into primary colors, creating a detail-shy set that is reminiscent of a Fisher-Price Little People playset. Pap’s oil drum BBQ smoker keeps his presence front and center as it’s widely acknowledged Rev’s BBQ is not equal to that of his brother. Rev may have his brother’s house and wife, but it’s a reminder that not everything can be transferred with death.
Freeland is directing perfection in Tio’s stoner monologue about playing a VR video game featuring gingerbread men. Williams’ uproarious storytelling is timed precisely, and there’s unity in the audience’s shared, soaring laughter. Despite the plea for patricide, the play is raucous and comedic.
This Hamlet is ultimately a healthier world. It uses the past not as an excuse to ruminate and exact revenge but as a tool to acknowledge the stifling results of not living authentically. Ijames ultimately posits authenticity as the path to self-fulfillment and a better future. This means being true to yourself, which requires the vulnerable act of letting people know who you truly are, not serving the expectations of others. It’s a radical and affirming act in a world where conformity can feel less treacherous.
City Theatre’s production of “Fat Ham” runs through March 24, 2024.
