Rendering №8

The title of the article is “ Shoes and Racism, for Sport”, it was published on " on online version of “New York Times” on 15 March 2013. This article is devoted to the play ‘‘Honky’ at Urban Stages.

“Honky,” a hilarious play by Greg Kalleres receiving its premiere at Urban Stages, would probably have felt more cutting-edge about 25 years ago, but it’s still a daffy treat, irreverently tackling a subject that appears destined to be forever uncomfortable: race.
And as Greg said: “Just because you’re late to the party doesn’t mean you can’t be the life of the party.”

The event that sets things in motion — a black teenager is killed for his trendy basketball shoes — feels less surprising now than it might have in the early Air Jordan days, but Mr. Kalleres has a good time with the premise, once it gets rolling. Before this too-preposterous-to-detail story is done, the shoe company president (Philip Callen), who is white, is taking a new antiracism pill; the white writer of the shoe’s ad campaign (Dave Droxler) is receiving highly unorthodox treatment from his black therapist (Arie Bianca Thompson); and the shoe’s black designer (Anthony Gaskins) is rethinking his racially based rage.

A play with this rapid-fire pace and this many scene changes really needs a revolving stage, or at least a bigger one. But the director, Luke Harlan, makes everything move as briskly as possible, given the limitations. It’s an intermissionless hour and 45 minutes that feels half that long.

According to the article Everyone in the cast is pretty good, with standout performances from Mr. Gaskins and Danielle Faitelson as a chatterbox who lacks the filters most people have to prevent them from blurting out inappropriate things.

Finally I can say that after the reading of reviews of the play I really wanted to see it. I think it worth watching, especially for young people.
http://theater.nytimes.com/2013/03/16/theater/reviews/honky-at-urban-stages.html?_r=0