Ulato Sam, Ahkei Togun, Jonathan P. Sims (Photo by Cooper Bates)
Reviewed by F. Kathleen Foley
Odyssey Theatre
Through November 3
RECOMMENDED
Among his many diverse works, prolific playwright James Ijames, winner of the 2022 Pulitzer for Fat Ham, is perhaps most fond of reconfiguring myth and classical drama for his critically acclaimed plays. Fat Ham, in which a young, queer Black youth is tasked with redressing his father’s murder, was a radical reimaging of Hamlet. Other plays include Media/Medea, a modern spin on the Euripides tragedy, and Passion of Osiris, an early work that revisited the Osiris myth.
Ijames’s 2017 drama Kill Move Paradise at the Odyssey also dips into ancient Greek lore, if only obliquely. The setting, a sort of waiting room in the afterlife, is described as “reminiscent of Elysium” — the Greek paradise inhabited by only the most heroic or virtuous souls.
However, there’s little heavenly about this in-between space, a bleak place which seems anything but paradisical. It is here that four young Black men gather to confront their earthly fates, yet unlike the characters in Sartre’s play, these individuals are not forever stranded. On the contrary, after much pain and confusion, they ultimately (and presumably) ascend to eternal bliss.
Isa (Ulato Sam), who has apparently been languishing in this transitional purgatory for some time, greets newcomers as they tumble down a large central slide, the focal element of Stephanie Kerley Schwartz’s starkly effective scenic design. Part saint, part reluctant administrator, the oddly Christlike Isa guides the newly dead on a trip down memory lane so they may confront their earthly fates and the circumstances of their deaths
Desperately disoriented, the other arrivals, Grif (Jonathan P. Sims) and Daz (Ahkei Togun) panic and flail, futilely trying to scale the steep slide and escape. When the youthful Tiny (Cedric Joe) arrives, the others are moved by his extreme youth. Tiny, still brandishing the obviously fake green gun that got him shot dead by police, cannot quite wrap his head around the fact that he is well and truly dead. Meanwhile, an upstage printer keeps cranking out page after page of names, a list Isa reads in its entirety. It’s when we hear the familiar names of Trayvon Martin, George Floyd, and Breonna Taylor, among others, that we realize we are hearing a list of Black men and women who have died in confrontations with authorities. It’s a shocking and moving scene, and it is even more depressing to learn that the list, painstakingly updated for every production, grows ever longer.
Paradise may strike some as thematically obtuse, with the four dead men representing some universal “sacrifice,” while the audience (whom the characters frequently and directly address) functions as a fifth character, i.e., passive voyeurs. Yet there’s no denying the force of Ijames’s righteous rage, an essential direness leavened by interludes of a painfully “playful” nature, as when Tiny has an imaginary, sitcom-esque reunion with his parents, complete with laugh track, and when the men act out a surreally over-the-top childhood game. The four performers, whose athleticism is on display in choreographer Toran Xavier Moore’s muscular dance sequences, are all excellent, able to convey great urgency and pathos while still nailing the occasional laugh.
Director Gregg T. Daniel is familiar to local audiences for his authoritative stagings of several August Wilson plays at A Noise Within. Infused with myth and mysticism, Wilson’s plays treat the same themes of Black powerlessness and marginalization that underscore Kill Move Paradise. Bolstered by exquisite design elements— particularly Donny Jackson’s lighting and David Gonzalez’s original composition and sound design — Daniel once again exhibits his commanding skill, framing Ijames’s challenging and elliptical drama in richly human terms.
Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., West LA.. Fri.-Sat., 8 pm, Sun., 2 pm Wed., Sept. 25 and Oct. 16, 8 pm; thru Nov. 3. (310) 477-2055 ext. 2; www.OdysseyTheatre.com Running time: 80 minutes with no intermission.
