"Tree" at Victory Gardens - 4 of 5 stars

Tree, by Julie Hébert, is a great example of the strength of community theater in Chicago. Certainly, Victory Gardens is one of the better "second tier" theaters here, and as such I've come to hold it to higher standards than others. Tonight, it lived up to those standards - quite nicely!

Probably the best dimension of this play is the writing. Ms. Hébert knows her characters: their voices, their demons, their desires. And she's not afraid to take us into the magical realism of Alzheimer's, trusting the audience to piece it together. The puzzle parts are richly offered up, and they eventually coalesce to tell a deeper, more moving story than we thought was in store for us.

The presentation of difficult issues - racism, abandonment, neglect, Alzheimer's, gender stereotyping - are portrayed authentically and with an excellent balance of humor and pain. Only once did one of these issues get "short shrift" - Leo and Didi's exchange at the very end about her love life - and I take that one lapse as the exception that proves the rule. Well done, Ms. Hébert!

The acting is fine by community standards, and in particular Leslie Ann Sheppard as JJ (the strongest of the lot, despite her relative youth) and Celeste Williams as Jessalyn give spirited and well-rounded performances. While it may seem trivial, I was particularly moved by Ms. Sheppard's singing at the end of the play - her voice carried the angst of the entire story in a way that was profound.

Be ready for some coarse language, though I never found it offensive. It worked best for me when it was surrounded by the humor that Ms. Hébert is quite skilled in evoking, but less so - mainly on the strength of the acting, in my opinion - when it was purely the servant of anger.

The set was a visual treat, though the choice of the boat rising from the mist at the play's opening seemed overly symbolic. The lighting design was also quite good, and the use of a few audio tricks was in the main effective.

The "bookends" of the story were the weakest, particularly the ending. Stop reading now if you don't like spoilers.

The play would have best ended with Jessalyn's death, perhaps with the inclusion of the final Creole song. The introduction of an entirely new subplot - the origin of Leo's name, never hinted at beforehand - was the most obvious example of what seemed to be a hurried attempt to tie up loose ends, and tie them up prettily. Better to have left this story about messy circumstances and troubled choices leave us right there - without the Polyannish proposal that everything will work out in the long run.