“Top Dog/Underdog” reviewed by Frank Meccia

*** The Gift Theatre presents TOPDOG/UNDERDOG, a play written by Suzan-Lori Parks, and won a Tony for best revival in 2023. The play is directed by Shanesia Davis, who has graced the stages of many theatres in Chicago, including Steppenwolf, Northlight, Porchlight, and The Goodman. She really presented to the audience a bond between brothers, one in which anger can break and then brothers can reunite. This 2hour and 30-minute play with a 15-minute intermission, at first, is hard to figure out; it takes some time to understand, but then you see the irony and understand it’s about two brothers,

Booth played by The gifted actor Gregory Fenner, an ensemble member of the Gift Theatre and a graduate of Southern Illinois University and from the Second City Conservatory. , is the dreamer in the family and also the hustler who wants to make it big by running games of three-card monte, which his older brother is an expert at. His older brother Lincoln, played by Martel Manning, is the breadwinner working at an arcade playing Abraham Lincoln. While the work is honest, both brothers find it humiliating. Booth tries to be as good as his brother in the card con, and his natural talent is shoplifting. The play is filled with violence and sexual assault problems that seem to plague the Black community in Rural America.

This is something we in the big city ,read about on a daily basis. It seems Suzan-Lori Parks understands the community and its problems and brings them to life. The Scenic Designer Jessica Kuehnau Wardell creates a functional and believable flop house-type apartment. TOPDOG/UNDERDOG is playing till October 20 at the Filament Theatre, located at 4041 N. Milwaukee Ave. Chicago, in the Portage Park area near Six Corners.

The Gift Theatre’s production of Topdog/Underdog, running at the Filament Theatre until October 20, sounds like a compelling experience. It’s great to see how Shanesia Davis’ direction emphasizes the bond between brothers while also highlighting the tension that can come from anger and rivalry. The dynamic between Jermaine Jenkins’ Booth and Martel Manning’s Lincoln seems to be at the heart of the play’s emotional depth, and Jessica Kuehnau Wardell’s scenic design helps ground the performance in a realistic setting. This is a play with adult themes, adult subject matter, and extreme sexual talk and violence; I do recommend 18 and above.

TOPDOG/ UNDERDOG will be playing from September 12 – October 20, at Filament Theater, 4041 N. Milwaukee Ave.

The regular performance schedule is:

Thursdays through Saturdays at 7:30 p.m

and Sundays at 3 p.m.

There will be an audio-described performance on Saturday, Oct. 2, at 7:30 p.m. and an understudy performance on Saturday, Oct.19, at 2:30 p.m.

Tickets for” TOPDOG/UNDERDOG” are on sale at TheGiftTheatre.org. Tickets start at $35 for general admission, with $15 tickets for students and $20 for veterans.

boxoffice@gifttheatre.org

To see what others are saying, visit www.theatreinchicago.com, go to Review Round-Up and click at “Topdog/Underdog”.

Additional notes from Julia W. Rath ( who also gave it ***)