Urban instrumental: The Piano Lesson speaks to history’s influence.

Stage

Arden’s Piano Lesson needs some fine tuning.

by J. Cooper Robb

The Arden Theatre Company continues its season with a rousing though not particularly affecting production of The Piano Lesson.

The winner of the 1990 Pulitzer Prize for drama and a key installment in Wilson’s 10-play cycle examining the 20th century African-American experience, Lesson focuses on the Charles family household in 1936 Pittsburgh (Wilson’s hometown and the setting of many of the playwright’s finest works).

The play takes place entirely in the home of Doaker (Julian Rozzell Jr.), which he shares with his niece Bernice (Kala Moses Baxter) and her 9-year-old daughter Maretha (Chioma Dunkley).

As African-Americans who’ve emigrated north from Mississippi, the Charles family is barely a generation removed from the horrors of slavery. That past emerges as a haunting presence in the play, symbolized by the old piano in the family living room that features carvings of the Charles’ forebears.

For Bernice the piano represents the family’s history. For her country brother Boy Willie (Kes Khemnu in a spectacular performance), it represents the promise of a better future. Traveling from Mississippi to Pittsburgh with his friend Lymon (Yaegel T. Welch), Boy Willie wants to sell the piano and use the money to buy the Sutter plantation, where the Charles family were kept as slaves. Bernice vehemently objects, and the siblings’ battle for the piano (and all it represents) forms the play’s central conflict.

Dallas’ production captures the extraordinary musicality of Wilson’s words, but the production doesn’t hit every note. Overemphasizing the play’s moments of humor, Dallas tempers Lesson’s emotional force.

Most disappointing is the bizarre staging of the play’s otherworldly conclusion. Under- utilizing Jorge Cousineau’s sound design in favor of Curtis Hodge’s psychedelic lighting, the electrifying battle between Boy Willie and the spectral presence that haunts the home is ineffectually staged and has little impact.

But there’s nothing weak or feeble about Khemnu’s performance as the determined Willie. Khemnu’s Willie is a force of nature, a tornado that blows into the house and threatens to rip the family from its foundation. Baxter’s Bernice is little match for Khemnu’s forceful Willie, though in fairness this imbalance of power could change. A last-minute replacement (Baxter took over the role with only one day of rehearsal), she was still finding her way with the role on opening night, and may well improve over the course of the production’s run.

Even with its somewhat bloated second act, Lesson is a powerful reminder about the influence history has on the present.

The Piano Lesson