Marlon Alexander Vargas and Alex Hernandez (Photo by Jeff Lorch)
Reviewed by Deborah Klugman
Geffen Playhouse
Through November 2
RECOMMENDED
If anything marks the Geffen Playhouse’s world premiere production of Rudi Goblen’s littleboy/little man as singular, it would be the joy that emanates from one of its two principal characters, a street performer who gleans pennies each day from gathering crowds and urging them to embrace his own love of life.
As an audience member, you get a taste of what it’s like to be among those crowds when Fito, the character in question played by Marlon Alexander Vargas, moves ebulliently around the Geffen’s spare Audrey Skirball Kenis venue, with the audience seated in a semi-circle on three sides and a bassist (Tonya Sweets) and drummer (Dee Simone) generating loud and vigorous music from an elevated platform on the fourth.
This interchange takes place at the top of the show. With a jubilant charisma, the performer commands the audience to respond — he shouts one word, the audience comes back with another. Even those of us mostly immune to these kinds of exhortations fall in line with his requests. (Later, secure in his success, he’ll pass the bucket for a few extra bucks on top of the price of a ticket —and he’ll get them.)
Following this prelude, the narrative starts to unfold. It begins as an altercation between Fito and his brother Bastian (Alex Hernandez), two men, in their 20s and 30s respectively, who emigrated from Nicaragua with their mom and grandmom when they were kids. These brothers, however, are cut from different cloth. Whereas Fito is a dreamer and poet whose life’s breath seems to be in the contact he makes with others, his older brother Bastian is careful and prudent, and hews to society’s rules. Buying into the American work ethic, Bastian works a day job soliciting donations for the fraternal order of police, identifying himself to the people he telephones not by his own name, Bastian Monteyero, but as someone with an Anglo name like “Bill Johnson.” The job is demeaning and pays peanuts, but that doesn’t stop Bastian from preaching thrift, circumspection and American values to his indifferent younger sibling.
One thing Fito and Bastian do share: memories of a traumatic childhood and youth respectively, which are marred by the violence that had been inflicted on their family, and the loss of the two women who loved them.
As Bastian sees it, his kid brother’s life is going nowhere, so (unbeknownst to Fito) he sets him up through an acquaintance with punch-the-clock employment. The job turns out to be cleaning toilets in public bathrooms (its “ewww” element colorfully described by Fito in comic detail). The work revolts him and he threatens to quit, so that Bastian’s ultimatum — that he stick with it or find another place to live — puts their relationship and their brotherhood in crisis.
In its framing, littleboy/littleman shares principal elements with other plays that pivot on the relationship between two siblings or relatives of color: Suzan-Lori Parks TopDog/Underdog, Tarell Alvin McCraney’s The Brothers Size and a.k. payne’s Furlough’s Paradise (The latter two plays were produced at the Geffen within the last 15 months, while TopDog/Underdog was seen at the Pasadena Playhouse this past March.) Each of these plays (among others) deals with the problems thrust upon its characters by how society perceives them — or less delicately put, by the color of their skin. In each case, the two principals respond differently, to reveal how variable are the ways that intolerance can wound or maim.
Deftly paced under Nancy Medina’s direction, Goblen’s play illuminates this conflict with its own compelling narrative — one that encompasses the desperation of the family’s flight from Nicaragua; the brothers’ veneration of their mother; the special joy with which one character embraces life; the inclusion of music and the fracturing of the fourth wall, and the sharp unmistakable portrayal of how racism imprints on the soul of one (Bastian) who would deny his heritage.
The production is powered by Thomas’s electric performance, with never a missed moment as a vulnerable, aspiring artist who can’t make heads or tails of his brother’s caution and for whom borders among people are immaterial. Hernandez delivers a skilled portrayal as Fito’s foil, a man driven by fear to become part of the mainstream.
Sound and music, composed by Goblen, are integral to the drama. (Some heavy duty percussion, performed at length prior to the play itself, may necessitate earplugs for some.) Under the umbrella of Soundworks, designers Noel Nichols, Bailey Trierweiler and Daniela Hart emphatically punch up the conflict and crises as they emerge throughout the story. The scenic design (Tanya Orellana) is minimal — basically a sofa and a single rug to represent the men’s living room. It works fine, given the scope of the story — this isn’t kitchen sink drama — but at times I contemplated something more elaborate to suggest a home. Scott Bolman’s lighting and the uncredited use of a hazing effect work well to define the mood changes, along with the shifts from happenings in the present to memory of the past. Christopher Scott is credited as movement director for this palpably dynamic production.
Geffen Playhouse, 10886 Le Conte Ave., Westwood. Wed.-Thurs, 7:30 pm, Fri.-Sat., 8 pm, Sat., 3 pm, Sun., 2 pm; thru Nov. 2. https://secure.geffenplayhouse.org/overview/littleboy-littleman Runtime: 90 minutes with no intermission.
