Theater Review - Hell’s kitchen
Come On In My Kitchen at 7 Stages
Legend has it that famed bluesman Robert Johnson made a deal with the devil at a crossroads in Mississippi. Robert Earl Price’s play Come On in My Kitchen finds the intersection of race and politics to also be a place of Faustian bargains in modern America.
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In its world premiere at 7 Stages, Come On in My Kitchen follows three powerful, prominent African-Americans (played by Brandon Dirden, Bobbi Lynn Scott and Isma’il Ibn Conner) as they become drawn into a surreal, shared dream that rings with blues music and satanic imagery. Gradually, the audience recognizes the Republican trio’s striking resemblance to two famous secretaries of state and one Supreme Court justice.
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Come On in My Kitchen provides at once a trippy tribute to African-American music and a topsy-turvy look at the current political landscape. Without warning, the cast will rock out to a sample of Jimi Hendrix’s “Star-Spangled Banner,” and the judge breaks into “Let the Eagle Soar” by Attorney General John Ashcroft. Compared to the avant-garde, at times confounding standard often set by 7 Stages’ new plays, Come On in My Kitchen is more accessible, thanks to its social satire, rollicking blues songs and raucous bursts of humor. Kenny Leon provides an amusing cameo on video projection as a powerful black clergyman who preaches rhyming sermons about his own ambition.
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Nevertheless, the play’s fragmented narrative can be dense and complicated, and it’s not entirely clear how the different pieces fit together. Two figures prove quite striking, even if you’re not exactly sure who they are. Tuner (Yvonne Singh) is a devilish persona with dreadlocks, ringmaster costume and spoken-word patter, and Blues (Valerie Hines, who also composed the show’s original music), is a power singer with a shaved head who belts out Robert Johnson songs and plays harmonica throughout the show.
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Come On in My Kitchen would benefit from a tighter script — it seemingly takes forever to build to the ritual re-enactment of Johnson’s death by poisoning in 1938. But it remains a provocative play with catchy music and pointed remarks about African-American assimilation.