SUNSET BABY, a Powerful & Poetic Play @ Labyrinth Theatre

The play SUNSET BABY is being performed @ the Labyrinth Theatre, an intimate theatre tucked back on Bank Street in Chelsea.  Playwright Morisseau's SUNSET is a masterpiece melding poetry, music, choreography & suffering.  The 2 sided stage brings the audience to its edge (literally & emotionally.)  The set is a dingy, sparse apartment.  You enter listening to a mixture of rap, hip-hop, soul & jazz.  Music forms the backbone of the play, resonating philosophical, political & social issues plaguing black Americans for generations.   The 3 actors performed with intense, raw emotion and artistic majesty.  Only 2 actors were on stage at a time. The movements & dialogue reminded me of Muhamid Ali boxing with Mayou Angelou's poetry.  The lyrical, combative conversations highlight the dire cycle of repression.  The demise of the family, incarceration, drug addiction & violence glared throughout the drama.  The desire & failure to attain love is excruciatingly obvious.  Nina (named i/h/o Nina Simone) is at the heart of this ferocious play.  She recently lost her mother to drugs.  Nina struggles to survive, resorting to drug trafficking & armed robbery.  Her father, Kenyatta, had been incarcerated for "revolutionary activities."  He pays Nina an unwanted visit with hopes for redemption & access to letters written but never sent him by Nina's mother.  Damon, plays Nina's controlling, street-wise partner in life & crime.  He has a son with a contentious ex-girlfriend.  "Beauty & power comes with a price."  Nina's father struggled to give his daughter "beauty, sunsets & the world, not glass, bullets & dope." The pen is an omnipotent tool for revolution.   SUNSET BABY rings as a clarion bell for change & social justice.