Sons of the Prophet

When I started this blog in January, my goal was to keep it up for an entire year. My expectation was that I'd make it to February. Maybe. I'm pretty proud of myself for making it this far and equal parts shocked and thankful that I've gotten as many hits as I have. Not that I'm rivaling Perez Hilton or anything, but how can one compete with photos of Lindsey Lohan with coke spots added under her nose using MS Paint.

The point is, nine months in, I'm feeling pretty confident that I'll make it all the way and have an accurate record of everything I saw in 2011, and you know what that means...there will be top 10 lists. Safe to say that when I compose them, barring an end of the year crush of brilliance, Sons of the Prophet will be featured pretty high up.

I saw Stephen Karam's last play, Speech and Debate, at the Roundabout Underground a couple years back, and I really, really loved it. It was funny and smart and while maybe not a play for the ages, it was a wonderful entertainment for the present. And as an early work by a young playwright, it was full of remarkable promise. I'm exceedingly happy to say that Sons of the Prophet builds on that promise while maintaining the first show's wistful humor, endearing characters, and delicious roles for character actors.

The plot in a nutshell is this: a Lebanese-American family with very, very distant familial connections to philosopher Khalil Gibran has suffered through more than its fair share of tragedy. The play opens with the death of the father in a car crash. The mother has already passed away. The eldest son may be developing a degenerative illness. The uncle is elderly and pretty much falling apart. Obviously, this is a comedy.

Joanna Gleason plays the oldest son's boss, a book packager hellbent on getting a family memoir out of them, linking the stories of their various sadnesses through the folksy "things are bad, and you should be thankful" wisdom of Gibran. Gleason doesn't so much steal scenes as stage all out Ocean's 11 style heists on them. She is utterly perfect, and it's a testament to the rest of the cast that they register at all against her. That they hold their own is a miracle of casting and directing genius. Santino Fontana is a perfect lead and it's almost unfair to even pick out other stand-outs in an all-around exceptional cast, but I'll give special mention to Chris Perfetti as the adorable younger brother whose sincerity, wit, and hints of childlike wonder beautifully balance the sadder impulses of Fontana.

There's something youthful about the writing of the play, and it almost has that kitchen sink approach that so many new playwrights fall prey to. It's about philosophy and ethnicity, sexuality and disease, depression and yearning...it doesn't just tackle big themes but also big concepts. By all means, it should go off the rails, but there's also something oddly easy about it, a tremendous warmth and heart that keeps the proceedings grounded and in human scale. I loved this show, full stop.