Dana Hunt (center) discusses with Tajai Britten (left) and Jonathen Blue his possibility of gay sex. Photo by David Minard.
By WOODY WEINGARTEN
Perhaps unexpectedly, since the play’s about growing up black and gay, whites in the audience of Bootycandy made up a plurality. But it made no difference. Boisterous laughter frequently erupted from every seat during the opening weekend matinee at the California Theatre of Santa Rosa.
The comedy, which details homosexual intimacy, employs f-bombs and nearly every other curse word you’ve ever heard. It’s belly-shakingly funny.
The top-notch, five-member cast, four of whom are dark-skinned, delivers about 1,738 laughs in less than two hours on the Left Edge Theatre stage (don’t count; you’d probably miss a bunch of gags that way). But, in addition to multiple over-the-top slapstick segments, the audience gets to see black culture through some serious lenses based on a dozen autobiographical sketches playwright Robert O’Hara theatrically threaded.
It takes some time, though, for the Big Reveal to tie the sketches together and transform what initially seems disjointed into something complex but a good deal more linear. In keeping with the offbeatness of the show, no backdrop exists for the actors to play off (or is necessary for the bawdy coming-of-age story) but scene changes are brought to life by substituting chairs, costumes, and props.
Tajal Britten skillfully portrays Sutter, O’Hara’s alter ego, who grows from an awkward kid obsessed with Michael Jackson into a semi-mature playwright. Jonathen Blue, meanwhile, stops the show with an exaggerated, hysterical portrait of a minister who passionately preaches about supposedly wayward choirboys.
Jonathan Blue (right ) provides big laughs in ‘Bootycandy.’ Photo by David Minard.
Dana Hunt, Lexus Fletcher and Shanay Howell, who each deserve an award for superlative clowning, fill out the ensemble cast in multiple roles that range from a pudgy male rape victim to a lesbian named Genitalia who goes through a “non-commitment ceremony” that spotlights such smart lines as “wherever you go, I will not follow.”
Director Serena Elize Flores makes sure the sometimes subversive and provocative two-act play zips along so fast that audience members leave with the sensation that it’s much shorter than it actually is.
Because the plotline is thin, the vignettes risk being labeled stereotypical and racist. That viewpoint, however, discounts the text also containing more than a few wonderfully crafted, expository lines like “All chocolate cakes ain’t the same.”
Although the playwright has adeptly fleshed out his male characters, he was somewhat stingy with the women’s personalities.
Bootycandy begins with a dude clad only in white briefs and white socks. It ends with a touching moment with an Alzheimer’s-afflicted octogenarian grandma craving baby back ribs, a poignancy that’s diluted because it’s followed too closely by a wonderfully comic dance performed by the actors after their bows.
Bluenoses and children should stay home. Most everybody else should see this show.
Bootycandy will play at the Left Edge Theatre stage in The California, 528 7th St., Santa Rosa, through Nov. 23. Tickets: $22 to $44. Info: (707) 664-7529 or info@leftedgetheatre.com.
Sherwood “Woody” Weingarten, a longtime voting member of the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle and the author of four books, can be contacted by email at voodee@sbcglobal.net or on his websites, https://woodyweingarten.com and https://vitalitypress.com.
