“Being Scared Since 2016 Is Privilege.” That observation, emblazoned on a sign in the Boston incarnation of the global women’s marches on Jan. 21, carries some provocative weight in Shepsu Aakhu’s “By Association,” now in a world premiere with MPAACT. The African-American family at the heart of the drama contains many reminders that for immigrants and people of color, fear of tyranny is never out of sight — no matter who wins the presidency.
Mother Almaz (Katrina Ri’Chard), whose own family in Ethiopia fled that country’s “Red Terror” of the late 1970s, has kept a packed suitcase under her bed ever since. When her 16-year-old son, Abdi (Kejuan Darby) falls under suspicion as a jihadist after a Chicago subway bombing, she tells him and her American-born husband, choir director Joseph (Benjamin Timothy Jenkins), “Don’t expect America to be any different” when it comes to respecting civil liberties in times of civil strife.
The title refers to Abdi’s friendship with fellow choir member Omar (Abdu Hytrek), a Muslim Montenegrin immigrant suspected of being the suicide bomber on the train. Abdi’s visits to a mosque on Devon Avenue with Omar, in the telling of Homeland Security agent Jackson Vincent (Eddy Karch) represent his Islamic radicalization — and if the family wants to see their oldest son, Sabona (Tamarus Harvell), a college student swept up by the feds as a pawn, they’d better cooperate and turn Abdi in.
Both Aakhu’s script and Lauren Wells’ staging reveal occasionally awkward transitions from the high-octane interrogation sequences to quieter interludes where the family members show us different aspects of what being American means to them. Joseph tells agent Vincent that his son’s name means “hope” (or “hope of servants,” in some definitions). “I wanted him to have a name that would ground him in something other than being black in America.” When we first see scholarly Sabona, he’s in red Buddhist monk robes, handing out literature on campus in solidarity with the resistance in Myanmar — perhaps a reflection of his own family’s history with oppression abroad. (In a running joke, he has to keep explaining why they’re not saffron-colored robes.)
Abdi’s interest in Islam, he tells his parents, grew from feeling alienated by the rituals of the Ethiopian Orthodox church in which he was raised. At the same time, he insists that Omar would never have done what he’s accused of — especially not in a year when the Cubs were heading toward the World Series. “If he had to choose between heaven and the Cubs, he would choose the Cubs.”
What Aakhu (who notes in the program that the play is inspired by his own family’s mix of African and African-American roots) does well here is provide lenses for examining the complexity of lives that are a mix of immigrant experience (especially African immigrant) and American. That mix is far more common on Chicago streets than on our stages.
Those lenses, however, don’t always provide clear focus. The Omar-Abdi friendship, mostly seen in flashback, could use more development. The device of a television reporter (Zhanna Albertini) delivering breathless breaking-news items feels overly expositional and a bit too on-the-nose as a commentary about how xenophobia plays out in the public sphere.
Though some of the performances feel overly hesitant (which may improve over the run), Ri’Chard’s passion as a woman desperately trying to save her family from a hell most of us can only imagine is resonant and affecting. As a portrait of what happens when citizenship fails to serve as a fail-safe defense, “By Association” has strong timely undertones.
Kerry Reid is a freelance critic.
Review: “By Association” by MPAACT (2.5 STARS)
When: Through Feb. 26
Where: Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln Ave.
Running time: 1 hour, 40 minutes
Tickets: $28-$32 at 773-404-7336 or mpaact.org
