Clyde's

Lynn Nottage’s Mud, River, Stone is one of my favorite plays. to me, it is her best work.

so naturally I was excited to have the opportunity to see Clyde’s, Nottage’s newest work that seemed to meld a lot of the things I’m passionate about: food, prison abolition, theatre. I felt really lucky — the play was offered as a simulcast with thirty dollar tickets for patrons under thirty. 

in my pre-show research, I read a review by Vinson Cunningham for The New Yorker entitled ‘The Search for Justification in ‘Clyde’s’ and ‘Trouble in Mind’.’ in the essay, Cunningham discusses the depth of the roles Uzo Aduba typically portrays and the lack of this depth in the character Clyde.  

and Cunningham is not wrong.

though Aduba’s face is plastered everywhere as branding for Clyde’s, the play is not about Clyde. the play seems instead to subtly focus on Jason, a character from Nottage’s previous play, Sweat. and Nottage does this in a really beautiful way using dialogue and situational comedy to highlight Jason’s plight.

but Jason is a yt man and Aduba is a Black woman and it seems a little backwards to market a play about a yt man with a Black woman’s face.

in addition, after conducting my own research about formerly incarcerated people and the food service industry I felt really frustrated by the crass jokes, borderline sexual harassment and financial abuse Clyde inflicted on her employees. I get that the play is a comedy and like teehee I guess but I don’t think Clyde’s vilification was necessary for the play to be funny. there are so many programs for formerly incarcerated people in restaurants and the context of these people from different backgrounds being in a kitchen together is enough for natural comedy to ensue.

it’s definitely one of those shows that’s performed like it’s onstage.

the tone of the play shifts quickly from moment to moment as the characters experience very high highs and very low lows. 

and the characters felt like caricatures— everyone was kind of the backdrop for Jason’s story.

Jason, covered in yt nationalist tattoos who “doesn’t believe in that stuff” anymore. 

and that whole thing is exhausting too because at one point Letitia (another employee at Clyde’s) says that prison acts as a great equalizer and it *literally* doesn’t if yt nationalist tattoos are considered a survival tool for yt men. does that not imply that a racist hierarchy exists in that space???

when it was about the food, the play was a bit more bearable. I appreciated the discussions about dream sandwiches and even the premise of working at a truck stop. and I liked that food news outlets were covering a play about food. that was really cool.

but overall and in general, this was a frustrating watch.

the scholarship was missing.

nobody did the reading.

and it makes me question the validity of being your own dramaturg. not everyone is gonna do the research it takes to make something true and authentic, so how do we verify that each playwright working without a dramaturg knows how to do this? what strategies or structures should be introduced that guide or govern research to make sure that playwrights don’t miss vital information that could transform their work for the better?