Call me envious, but the genre of plays that feature smart, educated, financially well-off characters screwing up their lives under the knowing smirks of the maid serves as a kind of comfort food for me.  And while the discomfort in class, racial and gender issues experienced by the LeVay family in Lydia R. Diamond's funny and quite heated family drama, Stick Fly, may seem a bit too familiar at times, director Kenny Leon and his terrific ensemble help deliver a lively evening.

The setting is the living room of the old-money LeVay's summer home in Martha's Vineyard.  (The unique situation that would explain how they, a black family, would have had this home for generations is only hinted at, and it isn't pretty.)  David Gallo's wonderfully detailed set displays classic hominess, but abstract touches allow us to see it through a jauntier eye.  A valuable art collection is painted onto a wall, rather than having realistic individual props.  The same wall is sliced open at an angle (as is a sculpture set at a table) to provide a peek into the kitchen.

Tracie Thoms is an endearing bundle of scattered energy - as fiercely intelligent as she is socially awkward - as Taylor, a grad-student entomologist (the title refers to a method of observing flying insects by attaching them to sticks) raised by a college professor mother who struggled to get her to school after they were abandoned for a new wife and family by her father, a famous author.  Taylor is nervous from the outset about meeting the family of her new fiancé, Kent - nicknamed Spoon - (Dulé Hill), a promising writer, but she has no idea how much she's in for.  She's intimidated by Spoon's neurosurgeon dad, Joe (an excellent Ruben Santiago-Hudson); the type that can switch from casual and loving to coldly judgmental in a flash.  She feels guilty about being served by Cheryl (Condola Rashad), the young college-bound daughter of the family maid who's filling in for her ailing mom (The moments between Thoms and the multi-layered Rashad give the play its thickest tension.) and she explodes with anger in a discussion involving race relations with Kimber (Rosie Benton), the white girlfriend of Spoon's older brother Harold, aka Flip (Mekhi Phifer), a successful plastic surgeon and dad's favorite.  But the privileged Kimber, who studies racial inequities in our education system, is skilled at keeping herself from seeming the outsider in such situations.

To make matters worse, Taylor and Flip had a brief past together years ago; a situation that was barely a blip on Flip's radar but tugged at Taylor's abandonment issues.  And to make matters a little suspect, the expected arrival of Spoon and Flip's mom doesn't seem to be coming.

The various conflicts and squabbles that emerge, as well as the big kicker, are more entertaining than emotionally involving, and some scenes come off a bit too melodramatically compared with the others, but Stick Fly is continually funny and the issues brought up regarding class distinctions among black families are not common Broadway fare.

The big name above the title on the Cort Theatre's marquee belongs to only one of the play's twenty-one producers, singer-songwriter Alicia Keys, who also composed the instrumentals played between scenes; a collection of jazz/R&B vamps that provide the occasional breather.  Some of them go on for quite a spell - the opening vamp was repeated so many times before anything happened that it was getting comical - but Leon smoothly glides the action in and out of the attractive licks.

Photos by Richard Termine: Top: Ruben Santiago-Hudson and Tracie Thoms; Bottom: Rosie Benton, Condola Rashad and Mekhi Phifer.

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"The word diva to me means doing something supernatural with something natural."
-- Patti LuPone

The grosses are out for the week ending 12/18/2011 and we've got them all right here in BroadwayWorld.com's grosses section.

Up for the week was: FOLLIES (11.4%), HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING (4.5%), BILLY ELLIOT: THE MUSICAL (2.0%), AN EVENING WITH Patti LuPone AND Mandy Patinkin (1.2%),

Down for the week was: BONNIE AND CLYDE (-18.6%), SISTER ACT (-16.2%), STICK FLY (-16.2%), ON A CLEAR DAY YOU CAN SEE FOREVER (-15.8%), MAMMA MIA! (-13.9%), MEMPHIS (-13.8%), PRISCILLA QUEEN OF THE DESERT (-10.0%), GODSPELL (-8.4%), THE MOUNTAINTOP (-8.0%), PRIVATE LIVES (-7.3%), OTHER DESERT CITIES (-7.2%), LYSISTRATA JONES (-6.8%), THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (-5.1%), CHINGLISH (-4.3%), CHICAGO (-4.3%), ANYTHING GOES (-3.9%), WICKED (-3.6%), SEMINAR (-3.5%), SPIDER-MAN TURN OFF THE DARK (-3.5%), RELATIVELY SPEAKING (-2.7%), JERSEY BOYS (-2.5%), MARY POPPINS (-1.9%), THE LION KING (-1.0%), THE ADDAMS FAMILY (-1.0%), VENUS IN FUR (-0.2%), ROCK OF AGES (-0.1%), Hugh Jackman, BACK ON BROADWAY (-0.1%),