Review: Sherie Rene Scott and Dick Scanlan's Intriguing Prison Drama WHORL INSIDE A LOOP

Though Sherie Rene Scott and Dick Scanlan are billed as co-authors of the intriguing new drama, WHORL INSIDE A LOOP, some of the play's most gripping moments were penned by a quintet of writers credited with supplying "additional material": Andre Kelley, Marvin Lewis, Felix Machado, Richard Norat and Jeffrey Rivera.

All five were prison inmates of the Woodbourne Correctional Facility in Sullivan County, New York, who partook in Scott and Scanlan's workshop on creating personal narratives, some of which were performed in the facility.

That experience serves as the play's inspiration, with Scott playing a fictional Broadway star referred to only as "the volunteer," though the text hints that her stint leading a 12-week course in "Theatricalizing the Personal Narrative," to six inmates who have been convicted of murder isn't exactly voluntary.

The title refers to a special type of fingerprint, and a major theme of the play is how we identify ourselves and others.

The inmate called Sunnyside (Derrick Baskin) is described as one the nicest guys you'll know, despite committing a crime so horrific it can't be mentioned.

The sensitive Jeffrey (Chris Myers) has been incarcerated for 14 years, since he was 16 years old. His moving narrative describes being so unfeeling about his own life after his mother died that he confessed to a murder to protect the real killer.

The volunteer, described by another character as "the whitest person at your own Whitey McWhite party," may be a fine teacher, but she's far out of her element concerning her six African-American students and insensitive to their cultural differences. When Flex (Daniel J. Watts) mentions he's from the Lower East Side she excitedly blurts out, "I love that area. There are so many great restaurants now."

Outside of prison, we see the volunteer immersed in her world full of white people, all of whom are played by the excellent ensemble, which also includes Nicholas Christopher, Ryan Quinn and Donald Webber, Jr. Unhappy with her current job, starring in a lousy, but popular Broadway musical ("Kind of a female Man of La Mancha. But with guns."), teaching the workshop inspires her to see if the inmates' material can somehow be worked into a Broadway show. But unlike Scott and Scanlan, she doesn't ask for permission.

Co-directed by Scanlan and Michael Mayer, the prison scenes are perfectly tense and raw, but when the action leaves the facility, the volunteer's world is played with broad, sometimes cartoonish strokes, decreasing their impact. Scott is very funny in the way she's always very funny; utilizing clueless pauses and excitable energy with crack comic finesse. It works well for this character.

Despite the snags, when Whorl Inside a Loop is working, the play delivers some powerful theatre. Fortunately, it works quite a lot.

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