The depths and fragility of family ties are exposed to heartbreaking and heartwarming effect in Amy Herzog's "After the Revolution," the vital, bracing and at times frustrating play that opened the Aurora Theatre's 22nd season Thursday. What's most striking about Herzog's script, and director Joy Carlin's production, is the skill with which emotional and political bonds and tensions are woven into an organic family unit. The 2010 play that made New York critics sit up and take notice, "Revolution" plunges into everything from racism, sexism and blacklisting to the campaign to free Mumia Abu-Jamal, the former Black Panther and journalist convicted for the murder of a Philadelphia policeman. Carlin and her actors excel in creating the intense family affection and radical pride between Emma, her father Ben (Rolf Saxon), stepmother Mel (Pamela Gaye Walker) and uncle Leo (Victor Talmadge). The erotic charge and mutual respect between her and Adrian Anchondo as her lover make the fraying of that bond particularly acute.
Reported by SFGate 21 hours ago.
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