‘Cardboard Piano’ Is Can’t-Miss Show

Rebecca Kent, Ethan Hightire and Tyler Cruz in Renaissance Theaterworks’ production of “Cardboard Piano” by Hansol Jung. Photo by Ross Zentner.

The stage can be wondrous place when there is a magic alchemy of realism and spiritual insight into the human heart.

Imperfections in script construction vanish as they did with the early works of the greats, because of the insights supplied by a dynamic script, sensitive actors illuminated by a careful director, all supported by an accomplished team of artisans.

This has been the root attraction of important theater for generations. Writers learn their craft over time, but when they demonstrate deep insights early that makes theater experts eager to watch them evolve.

That’s what makes Cardboard Piano, a two-hour experience with intermission, a play not to be missed by serious theatergoers. It has some laughs as well. Give yourself over to the talents of Renaissance Theaterworks (known as RTW), now at its resident home, the Next Act Theatre, 255 S. Water St.

Korean playwright Hansol Jung cuts right to the soul in the fever and accuracy of her dialogue – capturing the exuberance of youth, the vagaries of circumstance and even the transcendental fatalism of the human condition, setting the play in Uganda.

Few Americans know the political wars that have torn apart the landlocked African country for decades, a terrifying blend of warlords, strident Christianity, children soldiers trained to chop people up with machetes, declarations of death for same-sex marriages, outside noises that may be thunder or may be guns, the latter orchestrated here by sound designer John Schmidt. The play also opens and closes with the singing of a hymn.

The play echoes character insights set apart 14 years, in a chapel illumined for each age by scene designer Doug Dion, lighting designer Colin Gawronski and props expert Jim Guy — with cunning use of benches and a wall echoing both African and Asian motifs. Utilitarian and character-fitting clothes were created to fit each time period by Trinae Williams-Henning – and I am praising all these technicians early in this review to spend even more time on the superior actors and director Elyse Edelman.

Jung has simplified the story into two acts, the first on New Year’s Eve entering 2000, the second 14 years later where the characters tend to indirectly and directly echo the past.

Originally, a white missionary’s daughter (Chris) despite her parents’ disgust has fallen in love with a young black woman (Adiel) whose heart is giving comfort and solid advice while her passion and her legs are wrapped up in Chris. They plan to run away until a threatening child soldier, his ear bloody, breaks into their church waving a gun.

Jung opens us up directly on the human impulses, intimate direct scene writing led by Rebecca Kent as Chris, very American in her assurance that the lesbian couple can run away to a better world, and Tyler Cruz, equally vivid as Adiel, who stops to comfort the African boy. He is played by college-age Ethan Hightire, a new performer but physically and emotionally talented. He curls his body and whimpers as a childish teen while revealing he has been a “bad boy” – and then demonstrating that evil side. He has killed on military command, and he has been taught that same-sex relations are evil.

His escape is threatened when a bossy Black soldier (Dimonte Henning) with a machete breaks into the church to find him. A tragedy occurs.

Fourteen years later, the chapel is now adorned with stained plastic windows and flowers and a story about how 14 years before there had been a massacre.

The pastor’s flashy and assured African wife, typically middle class confident and chatty, is eager to give comfort to the residents (Cruz again, displaying her range and the warmth and power of her acting in both roles).

The pastor is buoyant, evangelical in his enthusiasm and hiding past demons (Henning again, here cutting loose with all his power I have enjoyed in many parts, mesmerizing us with a full range of happy attitude, guilt, anger and Shakespearean premonition).

Chris, whom actress Kent make a thriving memory for the audience, returns after decades away ostensibly to honor her late missionary father, while a troubled male cousin of Adiel (Hightire again) has been comforted in his interior turmoil by the pastor’s wife.

The stage is set for even more profound connections and insights. Even the cardboard prop of the title and a tape recorder play essential roles in our understanding. And the exit music harkens us back to the first scene – the Righteous Brothers “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling.”

The cast is so attuned to the speedy delivery needed for Jung’s dialogue exchanges – and director Edelman has wisely kept the pace popping – that there are moments when the diction niceties are swallowed up. Jung is playing the coincidence and subtext issues too hard, but the quality of the production redeems all. As does the play’s larger recognition of the price we pay for our human confusion about commitment, betrayal and belated redemption.

Founded in 1993, RTW is a resident theater devoted to promoting gender parity. For more information and tickets, visit rtwmke.org or from noon to 5 p.m. Monday to Friday call the box office at 414-278-0765.

Cardboard Piano Gallery

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Dominique Paul Noth served for decades as film and drama critic, later senior editor for features at the Milwaukee Journal. You’ll find his blog here and here. For his Dom’s Snippets, an unusual family history and memoir, go to domnoth.substack.com.