Unspeakable: The Troubled Genius of Richard Pryor

In 1967 a young black comic named Richard Pryor walked off the stage of Las Vegas' Aladdin hotel in the middle of a performance, disgusted with the type of material he was doing and the type of people he was performing for. Two years later he returned to the stage and stunned the country with a type of comedy that white America had never seen before.

Although black performers were becoming more and more visible in movies and television by that time, the image the country mostly saw was that of the "good Negro" who tried to fit in with white America and was "a credit to his race." But after spending years trying to cultivate a popular image like the good-natured Bill Cosby, Pryor now invited integrated audiences to hear the comic voice of the angry, disillusioned black man. For the first time ever, the attitude, experiences and -- especially -- the language of a disenfranchised minority was played for laughs before mixed race audiences.

He won Grammy Awards for albums with titles like That Nigger's Crazy and Bicentennial Nigger, and when he was criticized by black leaders for using that word, he answered back that this was the language black people used among themselves when white people weren't listening. Later in his career a visit to Africa convinced him to drop the word from his act, drawing criticism from the other side.

Playwrights Rod Gailes OBC (who also directed) and James Murray Jackson, Jr. (who plays Pryor) have drawn from his personal and public life to create Unspeakable. Billed as "a dramatic fantasia", Unspeakable is an abstract piece with a cast of 8 that explores the comic's attempts to deal with his upbringing, his relationships with women, his self-destructiveness and how they all contributed to the genius of his work.

It would help to know Pryor's life story in advance, as the text only lightly touches on vital information. It's never explained that he was raised in his grandmother's brothel or that he was married seven times. Deborah Keller, who plays Jennifer Lee (his 4th and 7th wife) also makes appearances as a rat, but the meaning of the symbolism is unclear.

Perhaps the biggest risk the authors have taken is to not include Pryor's stand-up material, but instead write original monologues that sound remarkably like his own. Routines about partying with Bill Cosby and defending the language he uses are performed by Jackson with mannerisms and a delivery that accurately mimic Pryor without seeming like an impersonation. These are the moments when Unspeakable truly shines.