In the Tony Award®-nominated play The New York Times calls “an uplifting folk ballad about the pure in heart,” Cephus Miles has the whole world in his callused hands—until his sweetheart Pattie Mae goes off to college and marries another man. Originally staged by the Negro Ensemble Company in 1979, and featured in the first year of Roundabout’s Refocus Project, Samm-Art Williams’ Home is a muscular and melodic coming-of-age story that gives voice to the unbreakable spirit of all Americans who have been searching for a place to belong. Kenny Leon (A Soldier’s Play) directs.
“Home” is opening at a chaotic time of year, filled with Tony Award parties and costly competitions for attention. I hope this unpretentiously and gently staged story of Cephus’ quest doesn’t get lost in the noise; it’s emblematic of what so many of us seek from time at the theater.
But do not fear. This is not the kind of play to abandon you in a dark alley, even if Cephus’s distaste for city life is the most compelling and counterintuitive part of the story. Plot machinations that you will see coming at quite some distance deliver a happy ending and may even elicit a few nonconsensual tears. No matter: They cleanse the soul just the same. Williams, who died a few days before this revival’s first preview, seems to have been willing to go anywhere to free his hero from despair as a way of freeing the rest of us, too.
1970 | Broadway |
Broadway |
2024 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
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