(Im)migrants of the State
Reviewed by Socks Whitmore
The Actors’ Gang
Through May 13, 2023
RECOMMENDED
Six months ago, the Actors’ Gang celebrated their 40th anniversary by returning to their roots with a revival of Ubu the King, the anarchic satire play that sparked the company’s beginnings. This spring, the King has been joined in repertory by a second momentous item in the Gang’s ambitious season: (Im)migrants of the State, a one-of-a-kind production co-created by an ensemble of alumni from the company’s Prison Project with the Director of Programs, Jeremie Loncka. The play is an extension of The Prison Project’s mission to provide theater programming to the incarcerated and to shift the societal conversation around prison culture, giving fourteen formerly incarcerated Californians the chance to retell their true stories on stage.
The show begins in the lobby with two “guards” who address and corral the audience into the theater in the style of a prison onboarding, though the level of immersion is thankfully mild and humorously flavored. The piece quickly seg ways into a series of vignettes exploring the lives and hardships of the various inmates before and during their incarceration, offering crucially humanizing insights into a community that is too rarely discussed with public compassion. The satirical humor and steady pace throughout make for a gratifying watch, though even in theatricalized form, the harsh realities of each actor’s life can weigh heavily; from gunshots and overdoses to rape and self-harm, the interwoven storylines address a wide variety of harrowing traumas and injustices. In particular, the play illustrates the pervasive impact of race and racism on gang culture and the criminal justice system, both before and behind bars, and the dehumanization inmates experience at the hands of criminal justice officials.
Like other Actors’ Gang productions, (Im)migrants of the State draws from a distinctly stylized form of physical theater, ranging from the comedic use of cardboard cutout props to the out-of-time, slow-motion dramatization of a gang jumping. The medium feels fitting for the project; the technical simplicity keeps the focus on the performers and narrative, which captivate effectively on their own. The script covers an unusual amount of linguistic ground, including bilingual conversations, explanations of cultural terms, and, curiously, several monologues in verse over the course of the show. Audience members can recognize the clear authentic voice behind the writing, and the disquieting truths about the system it seeks to expose.
The show’s ending almost doesn’t feel like it truly ends; the cast transitions to a group therapy-esque chair circle, providing a short but sweet opportunity for formerly incarcerated audience members to share their own stories with the actors, and the impact of visibility is palpable. It perhaps goes without saying that stories about incarceration are almost never told by those who’ve lived them, and (Im)migrants of the State is a necessary, smartly crafted disruptor to the pattern.
The Actors’ Gang, 9070 Venice Blvd, Culver City; Fri.- Sat., 8 pm; Sun., 2 pm; thru May 13.https://theactorsgang.com/events Running time: 90 minutes
