Review: ANGRY, RAUCOUS, AND SHAMELESSLY GORGEOUS at Portland Playhouse

Portland Playhouse is not known for playing it safe, so it's fitting that their latest production centers on a woman, Anna Campbell, who built her entire legend on one audacious act. In Pearl Cleage's play ANGRY, RAUCOUS, AND SHAMELESSLY GORGEOUS, that act was "Naked Wilson," a nude performance of the men's monologues from August Wilson's Fences. The performance was a critique about the silencing of Black women’s voices, and it made Anna both a legend and an outcast.

The decades since have been challenging. Anna exiled herself to Europe, where she could actually get work, but eventually roles grew scarce, and for a long time a bottle stood in for everything else she'd lost.

Now, she has a chance for redemption. She finally gets what she’s been waiting for, an invitation to a women’s theatre festival in her hometown of Atlanta, with “Naked Wilson” as the headline act. Anna believes she will get to perform her masterpiece one last time, but what she finds instead is that the festival producer has cast a young woman from the adult entertainment industry, Pete Watson, in her place.

The first part of the show has a frantic, slightly ungrounded energy, and Anna doesn't quite feel like a real person yet. But when Pete arrives, we suddenly understand what Anna is actually afraid of – not just the vulnerability of being an older woman naked on stage, not just the terror of finally getting what she's wanted for decades, but something deeper: irrelevance. Anna is not a woman accustomed to fading into the background, and Faith Lavon, who plays her, makes sure you never forget it.

Ashlee Radney is fantastic as Pete – totally unapologetic about exactly who she is, confident in her perspective but also sincerely hungry to learn, and determined to make her own mark. She has a completely different idea about who the most interesting character is in Fences. She's essentially Anna 30 years ago, and watching Anna slowly recognize that mirror is the heart of the play. 

The supporting cast is excellent throughout, with Victoria Alvarez-Chacon as Anna's loyal friend and manager, Betty, and Tyharra Cozier as Kate, the festival producer caught between old friendships and new realities. The comedy lands, but more importantly, the play earns its emotional payoff. It is angry, it gets raucous, and from the powerful women on stage to Thyra Hartshorn’s set to Wanda Walden’s costumes, it’s shamelessly gorgeous.

A few practical notes for theatergoers: You'll want to sit on the far side of the theatre from where you enter to get the full effect of Hartshorn’s set. Arrive early, as well – Walden's costumes are complemented by a hallway display of historic photos and clothing that's worth your time before the house opens.

ANGRY, RAUCOUS, AND SHAMELESSLY GORGEOUS runs through March 15. Details and tickets here.