In CLYDE’S, a stirring new play from two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage and her frequent collaborator, director Kate Whoriskey (Ruined, Sweat), a truck stop sandwich shop offers its formerly incarcerated kitchen staff a shot at redemption. Even as the shop’s callous owner tries to keep them under her thumb, the staff members are given purpose and permission to dream by their shared quest to create the perfect sandwich. You’ll want a seat at the table for this funny, moving, and urgent play. It’s an example of Nottage’s “genius for bringing politically charged themes to life by embodying them in ordinary characters living ordinary lives” (The Wall Street Journal).
The full creative team for Clyde’s includes scenic design by Takeshi Kata, costume design by Jennifer Moeller, lighting design by Christopher Akerlind, sound design by Justin Ellington, original compositions by Justin Hicks and casting by The Telsey Office.
Clyde’s is supported by the Art for Justice Fund, a sponsored project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors and by Terry and Bob Lindsay, with additional support provided by American Express.
duba, looking snatched in Jennifer Moeller's perfect costumes-first appears in a tight denim jumpsuit and leopard boots-and wearing Cookie Jordan's hair and wig designs like a parade of crowns, is excellent in a role that is slightly underwritten. Nottage seems interested in the tension between being in-charge and being plain rude, especially as perceived in women, but indulges Clyde's penchant for insults too much to remember to balance her out with much motivation. Perhaps Aduba's exacting performance, in which the venom pours deliciously from her lips, hints at a richer character than Nottage intended, but the result leaves a major gap where there should be a knowing reason.
Kitchen workers Letitia, Rafael, Jason, and their guru, Montrellous, spend their shifts dreaming up the perfect Bon Appétit-ready concoction at a purgatory-like Pennsylvania truck-stop sandwich shop named Clyde's, run by the mean-as-a-cobra, tough-as-acrylic-nails Clyde (Uzo Aduba, late of TV's Mrs. America and Orange Is the New Black). They're all ex-cons-something Clyde, who also did time, uses to beat them into submission whenever she gets the chance. 'She might actually be the devil,' muses Jason. And, in fact, she might. Consider the burst of flames she produces periodically.
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