The 2025-26 Broadway season closes out with a trio of strong revivals of diverse shows—Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Proof, and The Rocky Horror Show. Each offers a vastly different theatrical experience, pushing a dissimilar set of sensory buttons, but all share the thrill of connecting audiences to thoughtful examinations of timeless issues. Well, the last one is really about having a good dirty time.
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Cedric the Entertainer and Taraji P. Henson
in Joe Turner's Come and Gone.
Credit: Julieta Cervantes |
Debbie Allen’s production of August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone leans a little heavily on broad humor, but still imparts the author’s searing indictment of the traumatic effect of institutional racism on the African-American community. This is Wilson’s third play in his decade-by-decade examination of the black experience in America in the 20th century (premiering on Broadway in 1988 after Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and Fences) and the second one chronologically. Set in a 1911 Pittsburgh boarding house, the play follows the residents’ struggles as they deal with the restrictions and devastation wrought by the white majority in the aftermath of slavery. With the exception of Seth and Bertha Holly, the owners of the house (top-billed Cedric the Entertainer and Taraji P. Henson), they all lead a transitory existence, searching for a stable life. Cedric is firmly grounded in Seth’s no-nonsense approach of maintaining order in his house and expanding his metalwork business. At times, Henson relies too much on comic bits of business, but she clearly delineates Bertha’s motherly rule over her boarders.
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Joshua Boone and Ruben Santiago-Hudson
in Joe Turner's Come and Gone.
Credit: Julieta Cervantes |
The mysterious Herald Loomis (blazingly intense Joshua Boone), accompanied by his little daughter Zonia (a professional Savannah Commodore at the performance attended), is searching for his wife. They were separated when Loomis was abducted by Joe Turner of the title, a white “man-catcher” who abducted African-American men into enforced labor under the guise of the law. Cocky young Jeremy Furrow (bubbly and fun Tripp Taylor) bounces from job to job and woman to woman while entering blues contests with his guitar. Mattie Campbell (sympathetic Nimene Sierra Wureh) desperately clings to Jeremy after losing a baby and then her man. But flirtatious Molly Cunningham (delightfully seductive Maya Boyd) entrances Jeremy away. Offering solace and curing charms is the sage folk healer Bynum Walker (majestic and subtly commanding Ruben Santiago-Hudson).
