The Ripple, The Wave That Carried Me Home
There have only been a few times in my eight years of theatrical reviews that a playwright's work has moved your spirit with so much passion and comprehensive awareness within a play. Still, Christina Anderson is one of those exceptional playwrights, and The Ripple, The Wave That Carried Me Home, is one of the most provocative new storylines to hit theaters. This play brilliantly mixes humorous and fierce dialogue with powerful, gripping scenes that will mesmerize you.
Chicago's oldest and largest not-for-profit theater, Goodman Theatre, brings to its stage this dynamic production about a couple involved in activism in the 60s that affected the childhood of their daughter Janice. It's 1992, and Janice lives with her family in an Ohio suburb and returns to her hometown in Kansas to speak at a ceremony dedicated to her father. Janice is excited yet apprehensive about her return. She remembers her father's emotional and political fight to integrate public pools and wonders if she can put aside the past pain that divided her from her family and the city she once called home.
2022 Tony Award Nominee for Outstanding Book of the Broadway musical Paradise Square, playwright Christina Anderson, a poet by nature, brings a transformative and poignant story of racial injustice that blacks endured — where many witnessed the government's racial divide against blacks at pools, lakes, and anywhere there was water.
Anderson, whose 2019 "How to Catch Creation" at Goodman, captured the audience with the gritty struggles of four artists whose lives intersect in pursuit of creative passion and legacy; the original plan was to do a series of plays around (air, water, fire, and earth) Black American history. She came up with this storyline due to spending a lot of time walking near water — fine-tuning her understanding of water and blacks' association with water by researching blacks and their history with water and pools, learning that segregation played a significant part in why blacks couldn't swim.
Historically, swimming pools and beaches were among the most segregated places in America. With white stereotypes against blacks, many cities justified having separate swimming sites as equalizing racial peace to avoid interracial mingling and enforced this by threats, interrogation, and in some cases, violence. Goodman's resident dramaturg, Neena Arndt, does an excellent brief history of segregated swimming in America in her article Pools and Polemics, breaking down "Who gets to Swim?" in the Playbill.
All I can say about this play is WOW! The feel and emotions within this play were superb, and the transition from narration to narrative was sensational from beginning to end. Christiana Clark (Janice) masterfully recounted the stories of her father, mother, and her own life growing up in 1965 Kansas. Clark engaged us throughout the 1 hour and 45 minutes production, hypnotizing us with her joy, sadness, and painful moments. And the brilliant cast featuring Briana Buckley, Ronald L. Conner, and Aneisa Hicks was faultless, and their chemistry on stage was electrifying.
The danger of the historical storyline within this play is that many may ignore this powerful message falling on their na·ive·té of segregation. And others will deflect, looking at its past (justifying Rodney King's beating in the eyes of the majority) and not seeing the repetitive history of the tragic killings of George Floyd, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, and Breonna Taylor, just because the water of their skin was considered diseased and tainted. However, playwright Anderson's ingenious combination of humor, love, conflict, and spirited dialogue is so illuminating and engaging that it leaves a stain on our so-called equality, sending a vocal outcry from the waters that carried our ancestors here that we seek mere acceptance within society. It's a resounding message that audiences can't ignore.
The play starts with a phone ringing and ends with the rings of justice. And the performances given by these four actors get a ringing endorsement from Let's Play Theatrical Review. It's this year's "Must See Play."
Let's Play Theatrical Review Highly Recommends The Ripple, The Wave, That Carried Me Home At Goodman's Owen Theatre.
Goodman Theatre
The Ripple, The Wave, That Carried Me Home
Written by Christina Anderson
Directed by Jackson Gay
January 13 - February 12, 2023
