Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – James Ijames contemplates the merits of gentrification in his one-sided new play GOOD BONES

• By drediman
• October 2, 2024
• No Comments

Playwright James Ijames scored big with his previous effort at the Public. That would be Fat Ham, which won him the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2022 (although the work found widespread success at the Public and later on Broadway, it was first performed by Philadelphia’s Wilma Theatre). Originally commissioned by Washington, DC’s Studio Theatre — where it was performed in 2023 — Ijames’s latest work Good Bones makes its New York debut at The Public Theater, where it officially opened yesterday. In essence, the play tells the story of an upwardly mobile Black couple who moves to Philadelphia with the chance to reinvigorate one of the city’s dangerous, long depressed neighborhoods.

Over the course of the one-act play, Ijames — and by extension his characters, in the form of the aforementioned couple (a restauranteur and an urban planner) and the contractor restoring their well-appointed home — argue the merits of gentrification, weighing its pros and cons. They’re not the only ones with something to say, however. Like Fat Ham, ghosts — or at least ghostly occurrences — have a prominent place in the play’s ethos. Such theatrical signaling clearing indicates which side the playwright is on, telegraphing much of the play, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Like the character of Earl the contractor, it appears as if Ijames sees things mostly in terms of black and white, with little opportunities for the newcomers — particularly the moody wife Aisha, who grew up in the projects of Philadelphia — to negotiate an outcome that takes into account both points of view, thereby potentially optimizing the benefits for all parties involved in the neighborhood’s future. Good Bones is at its most compelling when it steps off the soapbox and lets the characters breathe and simply exist, letting them thoughtfully contemplate other matters (e.g., Black identity vis-à-vis the socio-economic spectrum) without the pressure of responding to the play’s central agenda.

The handsome production (the set design is by Maruti Evans) has been directed by The Public’s Associate Artistic Director Saheem Ali, whose staging quietly conveys — in part though some subtle but highly effective lighting and sound design work by Barbara Samuels and Fan Zhang, respectively — the gravity of the play’s themes. Throughout, the performances by the production’s quartet of actors (Mamoudou Athie, Téa Guarino, Khris Davis, and Susan Kelechi Watson) are largely very good, although at times they seem little more than mouthpieces for the playwright. Nevertheless, they do well to sidestep caricature to animate their characters with specificity and passion.

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GOOD BONES
Off-Broadway, Play
The Public Theater
1 hour, 45 minutes (without an intermission)
Through October 27