One American’s promised land is another’s Egypt. Unless you’re a Native American (in which case you’ve got problems all your own), you and yours came here either to get free or to be sold into slavery. No wonder there’s so little commonality between this country’s white and black people, quite aside from the horrors of racism: Even if it were possible to wave a magic equity wand over the nation, so that everybody suddenly had a fair chance, our narratives would still be diametrically opposed. Perfect inversions of each other, in fact.
Aunt Lily brings a tragic wildness to Crumbs From the Table of Joy, tragic wildness being precisely what Pearl Cleage’s Flyin’ West lacks. Or, more accurately, renounces. Earnest in tone, folkloric in approach, and ultimately plodding in Chuck Smith’s staging for American Blues Theater, Cleage’s drama takes a fascinating passage from American history and makes it the occasion for a morality play about the nobility of black self-reliance—especially self-reliance among black women—and the treachery of those who would imitate white ways.
Through 11/18: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 3 PM, Raven Theatre, 6157 N. Clark, 773-338-2177, raventheatre.com, $43, $38 seniors and teachers, $15 students and military.
Flyin’ West Through 11/3, Thu-Fri 7:30 PM, Sat 3 and 7:30 PM, Sun 2:30 PM, Stage 773, 1225 W. Belmont, 773-327-5252, americanbluestheater.com, $29-$39.
