A few weeks ago at the CVCA Auction, Mer “won” some tickets to Weathervane Playhouse, which is a very good community theater nearby. The tickets were to be used for a Sunday matinee, so last Sunday we headed down into the Valley to go see a play. I did not know what play we were going to see, since Mer was surprising me, but it turned out to be a play I knew nothing about at all, Great White Hope.

The play is a play about a black boxer named Jack Jefferson. Jefferson’s life in the play is based loosely on that of the real-life boxer Jack Johnson. In the play, Jefferson is an up-and-coming fighter who wants to fight for the heavyweight boxing title, and wins it from a white man. The action of the play then explores how fight promoters and even the FBI try to conspire to get a white man to win the title back. The play itself looks at racism and at how one man tries to stand up against the system, at great personal cost.

I really enjoyed the play. It was a “pure viewing” – a term Mer uses to describe seeing a play or movie or reading a book with no exposure to it at all. For good works, a pure viewing is full of the pleasure of discovery. Great White Hope did not disappoint here – it was a compelling drama, and was very well acted.

The lead was perfect for the role. He was a physical specimen, built and completely believable as a world-class boxer. In addition to his physical presence, he was a fine actor, able to naturally say his lines, even when he was working out and punching the punching bag. The leading lady and love interest was also an excellent actor, with a great stage presence and good chemistry with Jefferson. The supporting cast was also very good, with only a few actors who could have worked on projecting into the audience (the actors are unmiked at Weathervane).

There were a couple of minor disappointments with the staging of the play. There were times where either the actor or the director made the choice to have a major character speak with his or her back to the audience. That made it almost impossible to hear at those times, and I am surprised that was not caught in rehearsals. The other problem I had with the play is that it was not clear to me that I was watching historical fiction. Everything in the playbill and in the lobby made it seem as if the play were recreating a historical event. It is not a huge deal, but it was disappointing to be worked up over some of the issues the play raised, only to go home to read more about the real-life boxer, Johnson, and realize that the play exaggerated or even made up some of the most dramatic moments. I don’t know why it bothered me, but it did – I felt as if I had been a little manipulated. I would have liked a playbill note that the play was based on the life of Johnson, and that would have let me know it was a dramatic telling of the story.

Still, I am glad to have seen the play. It was well acted, and raised some interesting perspectives on racism, and caused me to be interested enough in the main character to do some reading on my own. When a play does that, it has succeeded quite well.