Review - Milk Like Sugar

The inner city teenage girls in Kirsten Greenidge's moving new drama, Milk Like Sugar, want only one thing from a boy... a baby.

When we first meet the trio in a tattoo parlor (A symbol of permanence, I suppose.) the bubbly Margie (Nikiya Mathis) is already eight weeks along and is excited for all the expensive baby stuff she's going to get ("You put what you want on a list. Then everyone you invite to your party has to buy things off that list. That's how it's done, I didn't make that up."), but what would really make her happy is if her pals, the very sexually active Talisha (Cherise Boothe) and the sweet, naïve Annie (Angela Lewis), had kids around the same time so that they could all have fun together dressing them in designer fashions and parading them around in the latest strollers. But best of all, they see motherhood as a way of providing the unconditional love they see as missing from their lives. ("Won't need moms no more if we each have tiny little babies made just for us, right?")

Greenidge and director Rebecca Taichman do an excellent job of keeping much of the play very light and funny, showing the carefree exterior these underachievers from poor families exude to cover up their acceptance of a future with little opportunity. (My guest, a Manhattan schoolteacher, vouches for the accuracy of the hip-hop slang dialogue and attitudes portrayed.) The story centers on Annie, played with touching empathy by Lewis, and her relationships with her mother and the boy she tries having sex with.

Malik (J. Mallory-McCree) likes Annie, but won't father her child because he can see a future beyond a community that is so accustomed to settling for compromised happiness, like powered milk that's kept on the shelf like sugar, that they tend to prefer it. Tonya Pinkins is striking as Annie's emotionally damaged mother who sees no escape for her daughter from the negative cycle of life that's been firmly established through generations. There's a bit of a problem in casting Pinkins in that she doesn't look young enough to have given birth to Annie as a teen - a fact that isn't stated until later in the play so the parallel isn't clear from the start - but her firm, understated performance is outstanding.

Also pulling at Annie's emotions are the charismatic tattoo artist, Antwoine (LeRoy McClain) and a new friend, overweight loner Keera (Adrienne C. Moore) who has delusions of a perfect family life and being part of a supportive church community.

Taichman, set designer Mimi LienMimi LienMimi Lien and lighting designer Justin Townsend make the most of Playwrights Horizons' intimate Peter Jay Sharp TheatPeterPeter Jay Sharp Theater, utilizing just an imposing wall and limited furnishings. Toni-Leslie JamesToni=Leslie James' costumes do a fine job of character-defining, as does sound designer Andre Pluess' collection of varying cell phone rings and signals.

Photos by Ari Mintz: Top: Angela Lewis, Cherise Boothe, and Nikiya Mathis; Bottom: Tonya Pinkins and Angela Lewis.

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