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Wilson's swansong gets posthumous bow

By Matt Windman

4:09 PM EDT, May 8, 2007

Tonya Pinkins and Harry Lennix, stars of August Wilson's "Radio Golf," in a scene from the drama by the late playwright opening May 8, 2007, at Broadway's Cort Theatre in New York. (AP/Barlow-Hartman, Carol Rosegg)

This has been an uncharacteristically strong year for new plays on Broadway. Tom Stoppard's Russian history pageant "The Coast of Utopia" at Lincoln Center and the Dickensian melodrama "Coram Boy" each offer spectacular visuals and casts of forty-plus actors. We also received star performances from Julie White in "The Little Dog Laughed" and Frank Langella in "Frost/Nixon."

But at least from a historical perspective, nothing else can compare with "Radio Golf." Even though the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson unexpectedly passed away a year and a half ago from cancer at 60, the Pittsburgh Cycle is now complete. Ending a two-decade journey that began 28 years ago with "Jitney," Wilson's ten-play trek exploring the African-American experience in the twentieth century has ended with a look at life in Bill Clinton's late 1990s.

In "Radio Golf," Wilson depicts an African-American community thrown into a state of cultural confusion, economic possibility and staggering ambiguity. Harmond Wilks (Harry Lennix, of "24"), a real estate executive, is on the verge of completing a multi-million dollar deal to rebuild an urban ghetto with a Whole Foods, Starbucks and Barnes and Noble. He is a society magnet and a leading candidate for mayor. He, however, soon learns that he is about to destroy 1839 Wylie Avenue, once the home of the centuries-old Aunt Ester.

Had Wilson still been alive, the version of "Radio Golf" to eventually make it to Broadway would have probably been very different. Harmond Wilks remains an underwritten character with an unclear dramatic trajectory. The plot is slow to move, especially in the first act. And Harmond's wife, played by Tonya Pinkins, is more or less an empty role.

But even if "Radio Golf" does not live up to his masterpieces "Fences," "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" and "The Piano Lesson," Wilson's vibrant spirit remains alive in the play's three supporting male characters, all of which get the most from Wilson's fiery, musical dialogue and more directly display Wilson's concern for the survival of African-American identity into the twenty-first century and beyond.

Cort Theatre, 138 West 48th St, 212-239-6200, $31.25-96.25. Tues 8pm, Wed 2 & 8pm, Thurs-Fri 8pm,Sat 2 & 8pm, Sun 3pm. Open Run.