Concluding a four-show run as one of Signature Theater’s writers-in-residence, Dominique Morisseau looks beyond her usual American petri dish in the comic and contemplative “Bad Kreyòl.” It’s the second world premiere of her seven-year tenure (stretched from five because of the Covid pandemic) with the company, which has staged her explorations of 1940s jazz (“Paradise Blue”), campus race relations and slavery (“Confederates”) and the aftershocks of revolutionary movements (“Sunset Baby”).
In “Bad Kreyòl,” Morisseau follows a Haitian American woman’s trip to the island, where she intends to work with nongovernmental organizations and reconnect with her cousin following their grandmother’s death. Directed by Tiffany Nichole Greene, this co-production with Manhattan Theater Club deftly tackles diasporic identity, as well as personal, familial and national duty.
If that sounds like a serious undertaking, it never feels that way here. Morisseau is incredibly skilled at weaving her ideas into compelling human dramas, and “Bad Kreyòl” finds the writer at her funniest, operating in the digestible vacation comedy genre.
When Simone (Kelly McCreary) arrives at the upscale Port-au-Prince boutique her cousin Gigi owns, her appearance is instantly assessed. Gigi (Pascale Armand) is a tough-love type, and their odd couple dynamic represents most of the play’s humor and duel of national mentalities. As opposed to Simone’s relaxed athleisure, Gigi is impeccably dressed in colorful fabrics (costumes by Haydee Zelideth). She is the picture of the hard-working Haitian who can’t understand why her American cousin lets things like personal happiness get in the way of a lucrative career in finance.
Another point of contention: whether Pita (Jude Tibeau), their family’s longtime housekeeper, is more like their slave. Born into poverty, he was essentially sold to Gigi’s family in exchange for room and board through an underground Haitian practice called restavèk. Simone says it violates international labor laws, Gigi compares it to American foster care.
In this case, Gigi says, it’s worked out for the best: In their homophobic country, the flamboyant Pita, who is gay, also finds protection in their home. Simone, of course, lives out a liberal fantasy by nudging him to join a queer activism group, an idea the fiercely protective Gigi knows could bring harm. But, again, Morisseau balances this gravity by making Pita the play’s beating heart, and often the source of its funniest lines.
Danger is more immediate with Lovelie (Fedna Jacquet), a former prostitute who now makes textiles at the N.G.O. that Pita introduces to Simone. Lovelie’s ties to Thomas (Andy Lucien), a bourgeois business shark and one of Gigi’s buyers, invoke a sense of widespread moral compromise in the pursuit of happiness.
In works like her Detroit trilogy, a survey of her hometown across decades, Morisseau conveys a sense of a conversation being had within one’s house. Outside of their unifying thread of Black American women sorting out their agency, none gave the impression of autobiography.
“Kreyòl” portrays an American out of her element, and might be a fascinating glimpse into how the playwright, who is of Haitian descent, sees her work at this stage of her career. One can take Simone’s well-meaning faux pas, as she suggests fixes to a culture she doesn’t wholly understand, as jabs at the theatrical institutions Morisseau has dealt with. But, just as easily, Simone’s use of academic terms like “affinity space” to describe a friend group — played for laughs, and scoffed at by Gigi and Pita — could reflect the feeling of a growing distance between the playwright and her subjects.
This is, of course, all speculation, and assumes Simone is the author’s avatar. But Morisseau’s hand is as firm in style as it is gentle in allowing for expansive, fractal thoughts, and that sense of double consciousness also fits into her continuing depictions of situations in which people are both perpetrator and victim.
The drama here is slighter than in Morisseau’s previous works, which plot out their dilemmas more traditionally. “Kreyòl” often feels like a hangout piece with an introspective calm, its scenes mostly unfolding as light culture-clash comedies under Greene’s breezy direction and the all-around winning performances. Kompa music played throughout (courtesy of Curtis Craig and Jimmy Keys’s sound design) and Jason Sherwood’s delightful turntable set — surrounded by a stunning, stage-length aerial photo of the Haitian capital’s vibrant hillside homes — sustain a buoyant mood. The levity is necessary, and rises beautifully around the play’s meaty core like the dough in the chicken patties Gigi bakes throughout.
Cooking up those patties is Gigi’s silent love language, even if delivered with more than a hint of passive-aggression. “Bad Kreyòl” beautifully dissects the triumphs and failures of trying to help others, and finds glory in the sheer attempt. As Morisseau is quoted in the preshow voice-over, “To love a people is to learn their language.”
The post ‘Bad Kreyòl’ Review: Dueling Cultural Identities Make for a Weighty Comedy appeared first on New York Times.
