<\/p>\n
An immigrant drama by Rudi Goblen about two brothers born in Nicaragua, \u201clittleboy\/littleman,\u201d now receiving its world premiere at the Geffen Playhouse, is an American story at its core.<\/p>\n
Lest we forget our past, America is the great democratic experiment precisely because it\u2019s a land of immigrants. Out of many, one \u2014 as our national motto, E pluribus unum<\/i>, has it. How have we lost sight of this basic tenet of high school social studies? <\/p>\n
Our tendency to ghettoize drama \u2014 along racial or immigrant lines \u2014 reflects the failure to understand our collective story. <\/p>\n
Goblen, who (like a.k. payne, author of \u201cFurlough\u2019s Paradise\u201d<\/a>) was a playwriting student of Geffen Playhouse artistic director Tarell Alvin McCraney at Yale, has created not a conventionally worked out two-hander, but an intuitively structured performance piece. Infused by live music and inflected with hip-hop style poetry, \u201clittleboy\/littleman\u201d crashes through the fourth wall to make direct contact with theatergoers, who are seated on three sides of the playing area and always just a high-five away. <\/p>\n Marlon Alexander Vargas, the dynamic, sweet-faced performer who plays Fito Palomino, the more creative and mercurial of the two brothers, is on stage interacting with the audience before the play begins. As the musicians \u2014 music director Dee Simone on drums and Tonya Sweets on bass \u2014 warm up the crowd from their platform at the back of the playing area, Vargas, ever-in-motion, greets theatergoers and counts down to the start of the show.<\/p>\n Rules are spelled out at the top that make clear that this isn\u2019t one of those docile theatergoing experiences, in which the audience is expected to keep mum as the actors do all the work. Spectators are encouraged to make some noise \u2014 to show love when they want to show love and to show it even when they don\u2019t.<\/p>\n These friendly instructions are impishly delivered by Vargas, whose performance outside the play has an effect on our experience of his character inside the play. The fate of Fito is the emotional crux of the drama, and what happens to him matters all the more to us because of our theatrical connection to Vargas, our de facto host and impromptu buddy.<\/p>\n Goblen sets up a drama of fraternal contrasts. Bastian Monteyero (Alex Hernandez), the older and more straitlaced of the two brothers, has a tough, no-nonsense demeanor that\u2019s all about discipline and conformity. He\u2019s a bit of a recluse, but he plays by the rules and demands the same from Fito.<\/p>\n A street performer, Fito dreams of opening a vegan restaurant that will offer his community access to affordable, healthful meals. This idea seems far-fetched to Bastian, and he tells Fito that if he wants to continue living with him, he\u2019s going to have to get a real job.<\/p>\n Bastian hooks Fito up with a friend who\u2019s employed at a cleaning service. But scrubbing public toilets isn\u2019t Fito\u2019s idea of an alternative course. Bastian wants his brother off the streets. There are dangers afoot in Sweetwater, Fla., far worse than unpleasant paid work. <\/p>\n A law officer in town, a sadist who demands complete subservience, has it in for Fito, who describes this menacing figure as \u201ca gangster with a badge.\u201d He also calls him \u201cbrown on the outside, white on the inside,\u201d and bemoans to his brother the Latino infighting (\u201cthe worst thing they ever did was give us all flags\u201d) that only divides people who have political reason to be in solidarity. <\/p>\n Bastian, who affects a white-sounding Midwestern voice when he hustles donations in his telemarketing job, can\u2019t help taking the latter comment personally. He\u2019s made no secret that he wants to change his name so his resume won\u2019t be ignored when he applies for management jobs. <\/p>\n The two brothers have different fathers, and Fito doesn\u2019t have the option of passing. In any case, he\u2019s more embracing of his identity as a person of color than Bastian. What both of them have in common is that they survived both their harrowing childhoods in Nicaragua and their unrelentingly challenging journeys in America, having been raised by a single mother, whose death still haunts them.<\/p>\n Bastian and Fito love each other, but don\u2019t always like each other. Hernandez\u2019s Bastian is a formidable presence, angry, strict and domineering \u2014 the qualities he\u2019s needed to navigate a bureaucratic system that has little concern for the feelings of immigrant outsiders. Vargas\u2019 Fito, by contrast, has his head in the clouds and his heart on his sleeve. Goblen never loses sight of their affection even as their conflict grows louder and more bruising. <\/p>\n Bassist Tonya Sweets, from left, Marlon Alexander Vargas and drummer Dee Simone in \u201clittleboy\/littleman\u201d at Geffen Playhouse.<\/p>\n (Jeff Lorch)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n \u201clittleboy\/littleman\u201d is tricky in its theatrical rhythms. It\u2019s like a piece of music that keeps switching harmonic structures, not wanting to get stuck in the same groove. Goblen\u2019s manner of writing is closer to free jazz or freestyle hip-hop than traditional drama.<\/p>\n Director Nancy Medina\u2019s staging, circumnavigating a theatrical circle, lifts the audience out of its proscenium passivity into something almost immersive and definitely interactive. Tanya Orellana\u2019s scenic design and Scott Bolman\u2019s moody lighting create a performance space that is well suited to a work composed as a series of riffs. The influence of McCraney\u2019s \u201cThe Brothers Size\u201d<\/a> is palpable not only in the thematic architecture of the play, but also in how the piece moves on stage.<\/p>\n The staccato nature of the writing is helped enormously by the entrancing acting of both Vargas, who breezes through different theatrical realms as though he had wings, and Hernandez, who locks realistically into character. It\u2019s a credit to the play and to the performers that, by the end of \u201clittleboy\/littleman,\u201d the differences between the two brothers seem less important than what they have in common.<\/p>\n Not all the dramatic elements are smoothly integrated, but the production ultimately finds a coherence, not so much in the music (composed by Goblen himself), but in the emotional truth of the brothers\u2019 pressure-cooker lives. Vulnerability unites not only Bastian and Fito, but all of us witnessing their story who hope against hope that compassion will somehow win the day.<\/p>\n ‘littleboy\/littleman’<\/p>\n Where:<\/b> Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater at Geffen Playhouse, 10886 Le Conte Ave., Los Angeles<\/p>\n When:<\/b> 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays-Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays, 3 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Ends Nov. 2<\/p>\n Tickets:<\/b> $45 – $109 (subject to change)<\/p>\n