THE HANGOVER REPORT – Samuel D. Hunter’s sad, magnificent GREATER CLEMENTS skillfully creates a microcosm for current-day America
- By drediman
- January 7, 2020
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This weekend, I caught Samuel D. Hunter’s magnificent new Off-Broadway play Greater Clements, courtesy of Lincoln Center Theater at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater. Mr. Hunter – a recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship in 2014 – has steadily crafted a niche for himself in American playwriting, having written over the last decade a string of considerably nuanced plays depicting everyday people in declining small towns in the Middle America (particularly in his home state of Idaho) and their struggle to maintain human dignity in the face of a shifting economic landscape. Greater Clements, perhaps his strongest (and lengthiest) play to date, is no different.
Clements is a small town in Idaho that has largely depended on the Dodson Mine – which has closed – for economic sustenance. In light of this and other unfortunate and frustrating circumstances, the town’s citizens have voted to disincorporate the municipality. Thus the play, which is told mainly through the experience of one of Clements’ most respected longtime inhabitants (played by the great Judith Ivey), begins. Mr. Hunter is finally coming to a state of maturity as a playwright (I thought his Lewiston/Clarkston was one of the very best plays of 2018). Indeed, in the soulful and sad three-act Greater Clements, he skillfully creates a microcosm for current-day America which skillfully examines a number of issues on all our minds (e.g., intense political and social divide, mental illness, race relations, to name a few), despite the acute specificity of the piece. Although I question a small handful of the histrionic plot choices (particularly the ending), I nonetheless continue to be haunted by the complexity and escalating anxieties of his characters. In many ways, the piece calls to mind Lynn Nottage’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Sweat. Greater Clements, however, is its own beast and arguably the better of the two plays.
The play has been beautifully directed with piercing clarity by Mr. Hunter’s longtime collaborator Davis McCallum, who has fascinatingly transformed the Newhouse into an immersive, in-the-round performance space. Although this occasionally results in some awkward site lines, I found the experiment in spacial dimensions to be largely successful (although some others may disagree), resulting in maximum intimacy. I also found the acting to be among some of the most powerful and quietly devastating in town. As the play’s central character, the imminently likable Ms. Ivey gives an affecting portrayal of a conflicted woman that’s all the more heartbreaking for its everywoman naturalism. And as her mentally-challenged son, Edmund Donovan is giving a fearless and probing performance that’s simply gut-wrenching. It’s undoubtedly one of the breakout performances of the season.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
GREATER CLEMENTS
Off-Broadway, Play
Lincoln Center Theater / Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater
2 hours, 50 minutes (with two intermissions)
Through January 19
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