BY MARTIN DENTON | I’s late afternoon in a cheerful house in the American Southwest. A woman in her 60s is on her way out to do some errands when her son, Jimmy, runs in unexpectedly. Jimmy’s 15-year-old son Tyler has been taken to the hospital…because Jimmy beat him — senselessly, mercilessly. “There was a man older than me in his bed,” Jimmy tells his mother. “The man was naked…”
So begins the harrowing first scene of Carol Carpenter’s intense, incisive, sad and thought-provoking new play “Sweet, Sweet Spirit.” It’s being presented by Manhattan Theatre Works (MTWorks) at The Theater at the 14th Street Y in Manhattan. Joan Kane is the director and the cast includes MTWorks artistic director David Stallings along with Carol Hickey, Gary Hilborn, Deanna McGovern, Dino Petrera and Kathleen O’Neill.
MTWorks’ latest a tale of ‘human beings struggling with being human’
I almost never go to play readings, but I did attend one for “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” — this past winter, after one of those awful Polar Vortex storms that we kept having. Stallings and his co-artistic director Antonio Minino invited me to attend and then lead a talkback with the playwright, director and cast, as part of their company’s NewBorn Festival, which is a laboratory for new works development. I was thrilled to witness this remarkable play, then still in gestation and nearly ready for the world to meet.
As “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” approaches its official world premiere, I can say with complete conviction that this is a truly exciting, significant, gripping drama. It deserves a lot of attention and a huge audience.
Carpenter is tackling some thorny topics here. “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” is, on its surface, a play about gay bashing and child abuse — but it’s really an exploration of a family being pulled apart by a catastrophic event; or rather, one that is taken to the breaking point by a cataclysm that, as we get to know them, seems inevitable. Tyler’s “difference” — acknowledged but generally not named by his family members — affects each of the members of this traditional Southern Christian family in divergent ways. For Tyler’s dad, as we’ve seen, there is rage and recrimination. For his grandma, there’s a kind of a test: Can the unconditional love she feels for her grandson overtake the teachings of the church that she’s cherished and hung onto all her life?
For his aunt, there’s simply a strong feeling of obligation, battling with her own other priorities. And for his mom, Suzanne, there is — reflected in Tyler’s flamboyant personality — an opportunity for escape and self-actualization.
Beyond these family members, Carol introduces us to another important figure in Tyler’s life — his music teacher, Kendall. He is gay and has lived in this same small town since he was a boy. Through him, we gauge just how much attitudes toward gay people have (or haven’t) changed in a generation.
Such an evolution of tolerance is just one aspect of the valuable mission pursued by MTWorks. (Their official mission statement reads: “Dedicated to discovering new plays that challenge our perception of diversity (ethnic, economic, geographic, gender, sexuality or creed).”)
Co-artistic directors Stallings and Minino champion acceptance and mutual understanding in all their plays, from their recent hit “Dark Water” (written by Stallings himself, and a recent winner of the New York Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding New Full-Length Script) to 2010’s “Providence” by Cody Daigle (a wise and beautiful play about two men — one gay, one straight — who form a bond after a disaster strikes) to Carol Carpenter’s earlier provocative comedy “Good Lonely People,” in which a prodigal (lesbian) daughter returns to her conservative hometown on the eve of Obama’s first election.
These plays — and others, featured in Indie Theater Now’s MTWorks Play Collection (indietheaternow.com/Collection/Index/mtworks) — delve into social, political, economic, and sexual identity issues with intelligence and wit. But down deep, all of them — in common with “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” — are tales of human beings struggling with being human. Stallings and Minino and their family of artists, including Carpenter and director Joan Kane, are creating theater that reminds us that our ability to love and care for one another is the most important quality any of us can ever possess.
As for the playwright herself, well, I am going to let Carpenter handle the introduction.
“Carol Carpenter was raised Southern Baptist, came out of the closet at 18, and grew up in the trans-Pecos oil and ranching plains of New Mexico — where the Bible Belt, the Mexican border, the oil business, the West Texas cowboy, and the poor collide to form a landscape of conflict. It is about this world that Carpenter writes.”
Carpenter told me, “I love working with MTWorks because they get my work. Part of this, I think, is due to the reality that artistic director David Stallings is a gay man from conservative Texas. We both attended the same small liberal arts college in Santa Fe, New Mexico, which brought young creatives from little conservative towns across the Southwest together. We were forged in some similar fires.”
I love that MTWorks is spotlighting Carpenter ’s work yet again this fall with their production of “Sweet, Sweet Spirit.” New York City theater people sometimes forget that great work originates beyond the Hudson. Kudos to Stallings and Minino for calling attention to a playwright who hails from far-away-seeming Madrid, New Mexico.
And kudos, too, for giving over their fall production to a woman playwright AND a woman director. Carpenter and Kane are a powerhouse team, as I can attest from viewing their work separately and together. I’m excited to see their newest collaboration hit 14th Street this month!
Martin Denton is the founder and curator of Indie Theater Now, a digital library of more than 1,000 new play scripts from the world of indie theater that also houses commentary and features about contemporary American plays and playwrights. Visit indietheaternow.com.
THEATER | SWEET, SWEET SPIRIT
A Manhattan Theatre Works Production
Written by Carol Carpenter
Directed by Joan Kane
October 10–25
At The Theater at the 14th Street Y
344 E. 14th St. (at First Ave.)
Tickets: $18 | $15 for students
$12 for seniors
Visit mtworks.org/sweetspirit
