Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – Stephen Adly Guirgis’s blistering dark comedy BETWEEN RIVERSIDE AND CRAZY arrives on Broadway

• By drediman
• January 31, 2023
• No Comments

This past weekend at the Helen Hayes Theater, I caught up with the belated Broadway edition of Stephen Adly Guirgis’s Between Riverside and Crazy. A Pulitzer Prize winner in 2015, the play arrives on the Great White Way after two acclaimed Off-Broadway runs courtesy of Atlantic Theater Company in 2014 and Second Stage in 2015 (Second Stage is responsible for the play’s Main Stem transfer). Guirgis’s black comedy revolves around one Walter “Pops” Washington, a retired Black cop who has been pursuing a discrimination suit against the NYPD (Walter was shot by a fellow police officer off-duty).

I’m happy to report that Between Riverside and Crazy remains as potent and volatile as I remember it. In turn hilarious and blistering, the work finds the playwright at the very top of his game. Throughout, Guirgis drills home the notion that words are limited, both as a means for effective, reliable communication, as well as in their capacity to truly capture the essence of human beings, particularly one as psychologically complicated and knotted as Walter. As such, both the characters and the play itself shape-shift over the course of the evening, bringing them in and out of focus, both playfully and explosively.

As with both of its Off-Broadway incarnations, the detailed production currently at the Hayes has been directed by the great Austin Pendleton. An uncannily instinctive actor himself, Pendleton had drawn some award worthy performances from his exceptional cast. Continuing to lead the way as the flawed yet charismatic Walter is Stephen McKinley Henderson, whose titanic performance has only grown both more magnetic and slippery on its way uptown. Other standouts include Common as Walter’s brooding son Junior, Rosal Colón as Junior’s flighty girlfriend Lulu, and Maria-Christina Oliveras as a Church lady who pays Walter an unforgettable visit.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

BETWEEN RIVERSIDE AND CRAZY
Broadway, Play
Second Stage at the Hayes Theater
2 hours, 20 minutes (with one intermission)
Through February 19