Theater: Cort Theatre / 138 West 48th Street, New York, NY, 10036
Synopsis:
Grammy Award-winner Alicia Keys with Reuben Cannon & Nelle Nugent produce the Broadway premiere of Stick Fly, the critically-acclaimed American play by Lydia R. Diamond and directed by Kenny Leon.
The play follows the LeVays, an affluent African American family who come together to spend a summer weekend at their Martha's Vineyard home. The adult sons, aspiring novelist Kent and golden boy plastic surgeon Flip, have each brought their respective ladies (one Black and one White) to meet the parents. Food, drink and Trivial Pursuit tangle with class, race and identity politics in this contemporary comedy of manners.
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December 8, 2011: The daytime soaps are being bug-zapped from the networks one by one, disappearing into oblivion after decades of reliably dishing out startling coincidences and staggering secrets. Where to go for a sustaining dose of torrid, troubled romances and the occasional heated catfight?
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December 8, 2011: I can't call Lydia R. Diamond's "Stick Fly" a good play, not with its penchant for overripe secrets, melodramatic revelations, and lazy plotting. On the other hand, I have to admit that I found it entertaining, thanks to the rarely explored milieu (an old-moneyed African-American family), spiky discussions of race and class, and first-rate acting from a top-notch cast. Whatever its shortcomings, it's an exuberant work that will likely prove an audience pleaser.
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December 8, 2011: Something is very wrong when the transitional music played between scenes is treated as the most important part of a play. Unsuspecting theatergoers could easily be led to believe that music artist Alicia Keys is appearing in Lydia R. Diamond's contrived, overwritten, ridiculously soapy play, given that her name is splashed on the advertisements. But if you look closely, you'll see that Keys has merely provided some original music and is billed as a producer.
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December 8, 2011: The program note for "Stick Fly" sets Lydia R. Diamond's rich but diffuse drama about a black family on Martha's Vineyard, 2005 -- then adds these important words: "Not Oak Bluffs."
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December 8, 2011: A vibrant cast brings to life Lydia R. Diamond's new comedy Stick Fly, at Broadway's Cort Theatre. But while there are plenty of laughs to be had, the piece is also a nuanced look at race and class dynamics.
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December 8, 2011: The commercial success of recent Tony-winning revivals of Fences and A Raisin in the Sun made it clear there’s a well-heeled African American audience largely under-served by the standard Broadway menu. So it seems a savvy move to enlist Kenny Leon, director of those earlier productions, to stage a comedy-drama that wrestles with the problems of an Upper Middle Class black family. It’s just too bad that the play, Lydia R. Diamond’s Stick Fly, is such scattershot entertainment.
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