Choir Boy review – Tarell Alvin McCraney hits high notes on Broadway
8 / 10
There are other tensions operating here, too. McCraney typically layers his stories with myth and archetype. But here he's abandoned most of his poetic and thematic flourishes (barring an on-the-nose speech in which Pharus discusses the beauty of spirituals), working instead in a more naturalistic style that while friendly to Broadway can sometimes feel a little pat. The short scenes tumble on speedily, but it's really only in the clefts between scenes, when the young men step forward, not necessarily in character, and deliver forceful, emotive versions of Rockin' in Jerusalem or Rainbow Round My Shoulder, that the play takes on a real intensity. In these moments Choir Boy ascends and its choirboys achieve, as long as the notes hold, what feels like freedom.
