Theatre review: White People

“Guilt is not transferred through blood. I am clawing through life, just like everybody else!”
--Mara Lynn


White People is, as the name might suggest, about racism. Not the overt kind, but the small, subtle, hidden kind, the kind the playwright implies we all have hidden inside of us. Three different white people—a New York professor, a North Carolina housewife, and a Brooklyn-raised St. Louis white-shoe law firm partner—offer a series of interlaced soliloquies about, well, being white. They have nothing in common other than being white, but eventually their stories begin to intertwine when they have to confront an uncertain world.

Mara Lynn is a poor Southern housewife with a very sick little boy. He has to have a very radical and dangerous surgery, and she’s convinced the Indian neurosurgeon looks down on her. Her husband is trapped in a dead-end job, answering to a Latino foreman, and as her concern for her son mounts, she lashes out at immigrants and her lack of opportunity. Alan Harris is a prototypical professor; he lives in Stuyvesant Town, adores New York, and lectures passionately about Peter Stuyvesant and the Dutch years of early New York. He has one particular gifted student, Felicia, who hails from Bed-Stuy. He’s morbidly fascinated by her world, the world of gold teeth, gang signs, and hood slang. He’s not so fascinated when two black men accost him and his pregnant wife, and while he tries to bury his anger, his relationship with Felicia will never be the same. Martin Bahmueller is a partner at a prestigious St. Louis law firm. He’s a perfectionist, a stickler for correct punctuation and grammar, and rules his firm with an iron fist. No button-down collars, no loafers, no rap music on the radio. His brand of racism is perhaps the most insidious—he freely owns up to it, wondering why he must treat his black secretary with kid gloves. His is the most tragic story, however; his hard-nosed perfectionism, combined with his (perhaps too literal) black-and-white view of the world, drive his teenage son to commit a truly horrific crime.

While the stories and characters are interesting, I was ultimately disappointed by the play. Playwright J.T. Rogers doesn’t go far enough—while we’re treated to a panorama of racism and liberal guilt, there’s a lack of commitment on everyone’s part. The characters aren’t truly ashamed, but they don’t fully embrace their feelings, either. They waffle back and forth, first angry, then embarrassed, then defiant. Don’t get me wrong, that’s exactly how it works in real life—but if a play is going to address racism in such an upfront manner, I expect danger, discomfort, and full devotion to the issue.

Gus Reyes’s direction keeps the actors in separate spheres, both literally and figuratively. Michael Shulman (Alan Harris), Rebecca Brooksher (Mara Lynn Doddson), and John Dossett (Martin Bahmueller) are all fine actors, and they do what they can with the material. But neither Martin nor Mara Lynn change or grow during the course of the play, and it’s hard to maintain momentum in a play with no real action, in which two of the three characters are static. And, frankly, it’s a little odd watching a play called White People in a room full of white people. No one seemed uncomfortable or embarrassed, despite the subject matter. Is liberal guilt dead? I wonder how this would play in Bed-Stuy.


Written by J.T. Rogers
Directed by Gus Reyes
With Michael Shulman (Alan Harris), Rebecca Brooksher (Mara Lynn Doddson), and John Dossett (Martin Bahmueller)
Set Design: John McDermott
Lighting Design: Less Dickert
Costume Design: Michael Sharpe
Sound Design: Elizabeth Rhodes
Running Time: 90 minutes with no intermission
Atlantic Stage 2, 330 West 16th Street; 212-279-4200
Tickets $45
Monday, Tuesday, Thursday through Saturday at 8 pm, Saturday and Sunday at 3 pm
January 28—February 22, 2009