It is a testament to how natural, fluid, and impactful you can make your talent so as to embody multiple, human perspectives and moral codes. With Michael Benjamin Washington giving a tour-de-force performance by molding his spirit to about 25 characters within 100 minutes, Fires In The Mirror is an actor’s dream.
Written 30 years ago by Anna Deavere Smith, Fires In The Mirror has returned to Signature Theater until December 8, and the result is absolutely magnificent and devastating. In 1991, Crown Heights was burning because the black community was being gentrified by the neighboring Jewish community, and the changing cultural, religious, and racial demographic of the area led to tensions that became flames when a Rabbi hit a 7 year old black boy with his car. You have people that come from their own oppressed communities, some from foreign lands, and cannot understand that hate could still move within them even if they are victim of it by another’s hand. You have white men that praise their lineage back to Plymouth Rock but would rather be hit by a boulder then acknowledge that their ancestors owned slaves or killed natives.
The question is whether we can overcome our darkness if history is a strange bed-fellow.
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