By Arlene McKanic
The Black Spectrum Theatre hosts the Sisters of Color Theatre/Film Festival through March 26.
P.J. Gibson's play, “Prescription for Love,” the first in the festival series, premiered Friday night. This innocently sexy little confection is set at a block party which has been ordered up from the other side by the Gilfords, a husband and wife who have just died, presumably together, after being married for 66 years.
The ulterior motive for the block party is to either bring couples together or reinvigorate them, and for this the departed have recruited Love herself, a sprite dressed from head to sneakers in spangles, played ebulliently by Marcha Tracey. The Gilfords have thoughtfully drawn up scrolls with their prescription for love written upon them, which Love has stowed away in her sequined fanny pack.
Love is so happy to be given this assignment that when the play opens she's twirling from one end of the stage to the other, waving her magic wand and sparkling, 'til Discord (the wonderful A.U. Hogan) shows up. Wearing a red suit, highlighted by a red spotlight, and carrying a huge silver spoon “to stir things up,” he is one of the lesser demons from the more comfortable regions of the nether world.
To him, love is folly, and to Love's oft-voiced chagrin, he's come to bust the couples up.
They are Sophilia and Elliot, who have three children, two jobs and a mortgage; the teenagers Tyree, a rap loving young man, and Chereena, a somewhat prim young lady; Unis, the librarian of a certain age, and Cooper, the electrician who claims his single status is unjust punishment for the sins of every black man who's been a dog, but who's still ready to fall in love again
In one of the nice Shakespearian twists that Gibson uses, Love disguises herself as a mortal – in this case a waitress – to get the couples together. When Unis says she's ready to order something “tall, dark and handsome,” Love serves up Cooper.
Sophilia and Elliot, whose marriage has gotten into something of a rut, are inspired to recall her courtship of him through her cooking.
As Shakespeare himself would say, all's well that ends well, even for Discord, who, we learn, used to have a bit of a thing going with Love (which, when you think about it, is rather accurate).
The actors are all excellent, including Simone Black as the gentle but somewhat neglected Sophilia, and Douglas Wade as the overburdened Elliot.
Anthony Morgan makes a believable Tyree and Antonia Marrero is a bubbly and sensible Chereena. Emmitt Thrower has a shy, gangly charm as Cooper, the middle-aged man ready for love even though he's been burned, and Marlene Chavis' Unis puts across a surprisingly robust sensuality; she is definitely not, as Discord claims, “desperate.”
But Hogan and Tracy steal the show as the bantering semi-Shakespearean demigods, he with his blustery, streetwise, cynical, male-chauvinist humor (he suggests that when women get “worn out and torn up like old shoes,” they should be exchanged) and she with her flaky, teenaged, uncrushable optimism; she can strike terror into Discord's heart just by threatening him with a handful of fairy dust.
Bette Howard staged and directed the show, and though it gets a bit desultory in spots, “Prescription for Love “is a funny and compassionate look at love among the generations.
The festival continues with “It's Never Too Late,” opening this Friday; the classic film “Orfeo” by Carlos Dieques beginning March 23; and a poetry reading by Linda Michelle Baron for one day only on March 25.
The Black Spectrum Theatre is in Roy Wilkins Park at 177th Street and Baisley Boulevard, St. Albans. Call 723-1800 for showtimes and tickets.
Reach Qguide writer Arlene McKanic by e-mail at timesledgr.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 139.
