2513
(1 vote, average 5.00 out of 5)
Written by Harry Cherkinian
Mar 10, 2011
Greta Oglesby as Ma Rainey
“White folks don’t understand the blues,” says Ma Rainey to her sidemen during a break in the recording studio, which is run by white men. “They hear it come out, but they don’t know how it got there. They don’t understand that’s life’s way of talking.”
In the superb, flawless production of “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” at The Rep’s Powerhouse Theater, Ma Rainey (a real life blues singer) and her band know the blues all too well. They’ve experienced racial oppression, violence and humiliation. Yet, they find a way to go on.
For them, “life’s way of talking” is to create, sing and perform the music that had its roots in the songs and spirituals of plantation slaves. In a way, the characters of “Ma Rainey” remain enslaved, subjugated to the machinations of the white man’s recording industry – underpaying, overpromising and, in the end, maintaining the unequal balance of the status between the races.
Ma Rainey is based on Gertrude “Ma” Rainey, known as the “Mother of the Blues.” She influenced artists as diverse as her immediate rival Bessie Smith (“Empress of the Blues”) to contemporary folk music master Bob Dylan (“Highway 61 Revisited’). On stage, Ma is difficult, demanding, ill-tempered – “a diva” long before the term was ever dreamed up.
As Rainey and her band attempt to record some new tracks, including the “Black Bottom” dance, their stories unfold. Their tales of physical and sexual violence, racial humiliation and subjugation are told with an offhandedness that underscores the fact these horrors are their everyday reality, all they’ve ever known.
Done as a co-production with the Actors Theatre of Louisville, director Ron O.J. Parsons brings a lyrical beauty to the harsh language and all-too-realistic atmosphere created by playwright August Wilson. “Ma Rainey” is one of the 10 plays in Wilson’s “Pittsburgh Cycle,” which details the African-American experience.
Although it’s been 29 years since its inception, the play continues to resonate today, especially in this joint production, with its excellent ensemble cast. The actors so fully inhabit each character that it’s easy to forget they’re acting.
Rainey’s four musicians represent various perspectives of the African-American experience. There’s the literate, self-educated pianist Toledo (Alfred H. Wilson), Cutler (Ernest Perry, Jr.), who understands what it takes to make the session successful, and his good friend Slow Drag (A.C. Smith), who’s in it for the money. Idealistic upstart horn player, Levee (Anthony Fleming III) learns the hard way that trying to succeed in a world outside of his control can bring about disastrous consequences.
Greta Oglesby captures every nuance and detail of the high and mighty Ma, from the underlying meaning behind her petulant demand for a soda to her tough yet seductive gaze at her sexy younger “friend” Dussie Mae (Erynn Mackenzie). From the rough growl of her vocals to the soft purr in her voice as she strokes Dussie Mae’s smooth legs, Oglesby makes Ma Rainey a riveting character throughout two hours and 35 minutes (with a 20-minute intermission).
As Ma explains midway through the recording session, “You don’t sing to feel better. You sing ’cause there’s a way of understanding life.” In “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” that understanding comes at a very high price.
“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” runs through March 27 in the Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s Quadracci Powerhouse Theater. Call 414-224-9490 or visit www.milwaukeerep.com.
