Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – MCC Theater unveils its new Hell’s Kitchen home with Loy A. Webb’s agenda-driven THE LIGHT

• By drediman
• February 18, 2019
• No Comments

Mandi Madsen and McKinley Belcher III in MCC Theater’s production of “The Light” by Loy A. Webb. Photo by Joan Marcus.

For many years now, MCC Theater – one of the major contributors to the Off-Broadway theater scene – has been synonymous with Greenwich Village’s historic and storied Lucille Lortel Theatre. The Lortel is one of those classic (and musty) Off-Broadway venues that don’t seem to be long for this world, thanks to the realities of Manhattan real estate. I dearly hope it doesn’t suffer the same fate as other performance spaces (like Midtown’s Davenport Theatre, which recently announced that it would be shutting its doors permanently). Nevertheless, MCC’s previous production, its hit remounting of Jocelyn Bioh’s School Girls; Or, the African Mean Girls Play, marked the theater company’s bittersweet final production at the venerated venue.

MCC Theater began a new chapter with The Light, Loy A. Webb’s heated new play about sexual assault, which recently opened at MCC’s brand spanking new home in Hell’s Kitchen. The short but potent new play about a seemingly well-adjusted and successful black couple living in the South Side of Chicago starts off fairly idyllically. However, about halfway into the play, the loving nature of their relationship turns on a dime rather suddenly and drastically (no spoilers here) and becomes combative on a very fundamental level. Unfortunately, these turn of events struck me as somewhat unbelievable. Indeed, the characters more or less become conduits for the playwright’s clearcut agenda and impassioned views on social justice.

Nevertheless, Ms. Webb’s two-hander has been given a strong staging by director Logan Vaughn. Her decision to up the naturalism of the production (kudos in particular to set designer Kimie Nishikawa) helps camouflage the histrionics of the script. Luckily, The Light also features a pair of committed performances from McKinley Belcher III and Mandi Masden, two equally-capable actors who in the play display undeniable chemistry. Their strong portrayals go a long way to ensure that the audience is engaged and invested in the play’s central, passionately-sparred debate.

RECOMMENDED

THE LIGHT
Off-Broadway, Play
MCC Theater
1 hour, 10 minutes (with no intermission)
Through March 17