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“The Humans” in a Word: Excellent

by | Oct 3, 2024

As I settled down in my favorite seat at the Davidson Community Players’ Armour Street Theatre, (despite the storm), I chuckled, thinking this play is about a family behaving like any other family when they get together. Confusion and commotion! I’m an expert, after all, coming from a large family and then raising one myself.

Left to right: Ryan Miles, Hank West, Breanna Suarez, Alyssa Whiting, Wandy Fernandez, Anne Lambert (Sydney Schertz photo)

The bantering went on for the next ninety minutes—cajoling, accusing, laughing, recalling, chiding, arguing, doubting, tearing, singing, wishing, drinking, eating, whispering, accusing, loving, caring, sharing. But as The Humans, a one-act award-winning drama written by Stephen Karam came to an end, I wasn’t so sure that I am expert, after all.

Six actors delivered a magnificent portrayal of the quintessential Blake family that has gathered for Thanksgiving at the New York apartment where Brigid, played by Breanna Suarez, has just moved. Realistic! Packing boxes everywhere, searches for towels and toilet tissue, napkins for the table with makeshift paper plates and glasses. They manage.

Director Glynnis O’Donoghue was inspired. She cast this unique play well. Mom, Dad, two grown daughters, a boyfriend, and an invalid grandmother with Alzheimer’s. Action is timely and well-paced, delivery is excellent, dialogue is often funny, and the setting is superb!

The Humans script calls for a two-story apartment—difficult to build on the compact Armour Street stage. But Lighting/Set Designer Evan Kinsley’s clever two-level design is admirable —and attractive. It works. The countertop wall in the kitchen could have been designed a bit lower—it blends into the stage-front living/dining room with a few steps up to the upper-level entryway and a loo that is in never-ending use. Love DCPs new (refurbished?) furniture.

The actors seem to have been made for their roles. Hank West plays Erik Blake, the dad – loving, concerned, rattled, preoccupied, attentive, and ultimately surprising. Anne Lambert as Deidre Blake, the mom – cajoles and continually finds opportunities to zap her daughters, while munching on everything in sight, nonstop. Snuggled into her wheelchair, Wandy Fernandez as Fiona, “Momo” Blake, shakingly utters sounds, smiles, cries, laughs, or sleeps while her family lovingly caters to her needs.

Hank West (Sydney Schertz photo)

Alyssa Whiting as Aimee Blake, a successful businesswoman, is infirm and distraught, having just broken up with her lesbian partner, ponders over her dilemma—to be happy alone or unhappy with someone else. Breanna Suarez as Brigid, the hostess, feels insecure having not found a job, seeks ways to thrust jabs at her mother, lovingly accepts her father’s attentions, commiserates and giggles with her sister, and lavishes in the kisses from Ryan Miles as Richard Saad. They are all expressive and play their roles very well.

The Humans is a different kind of play. It’s worth seeing. Easy to understand—the story is about a family—we all have one. DCPs production is excellent, the set is appealing, the drama is creative—and intriguing. I liked it.

It’s human.

Connie Fisher

Connie Fisher, neé Consuelo Carmona, is a Davidson resident who grew up in Mexico City where she became a journalist and acquired a taste for the theatre. Her preference for work behind the scenes led to an interest in writing reviews—Yale Rep among her favorite troupes. Connie is the author of Doing it the Right Way, the biography of an Italian hatmaker. Her prose appears with 87 other international writers in The Widows’ Handbook. An active, founding member of Lake Norman Writers, Connie just released her latest book, "The Mongrel, Bi-cultural Adventures of a Latina-Scandinavian Youth," a memoir about her years growing up in Mexico.​

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