BWW Reviews: Luminous Cicely Tyson Makes TRIP TO BOUNTIFUL

The Trip to Bountiful/by Horton Foote/directed by Michael Wilson/Ahmanson Theatre/through November 2 only

In his timeless and invigorating script The Trip to Bountiful Horton Foote engages our attention with his keen appraisal that "The world can't be bought". Believing the best things in life are free - well, almost..., elderly Carrie Watts (Cicely Tyson), in her Tony-winning role, proves just how healing a return to one's roots, however brief, may be. This Broadway revival directed by Michael Wilson also stars Vanessa Williams from the original New York production and Blair Underwood replacing Cuba Gooding Jr. It's a stellar cast, achieving a truly beautiful representation of Foote's infreqeuntly seen work.

Watts lives in Houston, Texas in 1953 with her lackluster son Ludie (Underwood) and his lonely, frustrated and childless wife Jessie Mae (Williams), who browbeats and dominates them both. Watts can no longer bear her empty life in the city and yearns to go back to her country roots to the tiny town of Bountiful. She runs away like an innocent child with only some coins and a pension check in her purse. Her adventuresome journey is interrupted by Ludie and Jessie Mae, but not before she makes some life-affirming acquaintances. Along the way she meets and comforts Thelma (Jurnee Smollett-Bell), a kindly bus station attendant (Arthur French) and a friendly sheriff (Devon Abner), who sees to it that she sets her sights on the decaying Bountiful.

The ensemble under Wilson's lucid, precise direction is first-rate. Tyson, 2014's Tony Award-winning Best Actress in a Play, has the role of a lifetime and brings every ounce of luminosity and passion to Carrie Watts, keeping her performance at all times truthful and within control. Nothing short of exquisite! Williams is very funny as the irritating Jesse Mae. Despite her character's annoying selfishness, she makes the pain and sense of isolation shine through. Underwood brings strength and a lovely sensitivity to Ludie. Smollett-Bell is charming as Thelma. A stranger to Carrie, Thelma meets her on the bus and the two swap stories about love and romance. It is here that Carrie's fragile mind comes to life and she relates vividly the recollections of her loveless marriage. Tyson is a joy to watch and also in the moments where she proclaims her freedom and sings out hymns and does a fancy dance step or two. Abner is stalwart and understanding as the sheriff and Wade Dooley and Arthur French do fine work as bus station attendants.

Jeff Cowie's detailed period set design takes us from the Watts' drab city apartment to the bus station, onto the bus and eventually to the run-down land that once was Bountiful.

What raises this Horton Foote piece to a superior level is the compassion of the characters and his lyric sense of time and place. Trips backwards are disappointing, but only if we expect too much. Carrie Watts's gentle, warm acceptance of the inevitable makes it all worthwhile, and Tyson digs down deep into her very soul to find this woman's reason for living. It is interesting to note that Tyson filmed The Trip to Bountiful after her Broadway engagement, which aired on cable's Lifetime Movie Network in March of this year. At her age to return to the stage so soon to reprise the role shows not only her love and devotion to it, but her indefatigable spirit as one of our greatest actresses. Brava!

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