An incendiary tale of African genocide
Play has terrifying relevance to dynamics of race in U. S. today
Six actors go in search of a genocide in Jackie Sibblies Drury’s explosive new play. The Obie-winning drama can be both provocative and convoluted, much like its title, “We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as South West Africa, From the German Südwestafrika, Between the Years 1884-1915.”
An edgy collaboration between San Jose Stage Company and the AfricanAmerican Shakespeare Company, this is theater as a primal examination of race and power, past and present. The terrifying relevance of the piece, which is far more about the dynamics of race in America right now than anything else, and the sharpness of L. Peter Callender’s production, makes this “Presentation” so memorable. It runs through Oct. 23.
The fourth wall never exists in this play-withina-lecture wrapped inside a rehearsal. The meta-theatrical 90-minute riff starts with seemingly off-the-cuff program notes (deftly delivered by Oluchi Nwokocha) and builds into various improvised role-playing interludes, which gives the play a self-conscious, academic aes- thetic that may remind you of grad school. The artistic process comes off as almost delusional as these six actors (three black and three white) unwittingly find themselves confronting their own racism as they struggle to unravel the dark history of Namibia.
The well-meaning ensemble sets out to tell the tale of the Herero, a tribe that was nearly wiped out by German colonials in what had been described as the first genocide of the 20th century. The cast must confront issues of cultural appropriation as well as the elusive nature of truth.
Since the only record of the extermination and its aftermath that survives was written by the German soldiers involved, how do they tell the other side of the tragedy? The victims of the atrocity left no letters to document their suffering. Their pain has been eclipsed by the more famous genocides to come. (For the record, the Ger- man government finally issued an official apology to the Namibians this year.)
The harrowing nature of the narrative is undeniable. As “actor #5” (a tart Lyndsy Kail) puts it, with her usual deadpan pragmatism, the thrust of the piece is “the horror of our capacity to casually inflict suffering.”
As they untie the knots of hate and greed that tangle all colonial empires, the actors are surprised by how easily they slip out of their comfort zone, how quickly empathy washes away. Two actors (Edward Ewell and Coleton Schmitto) battle over whether there is any difference between being “black” and being “African.” One suggests the eradication of the Herero was a sort of “rehearsal Holocaust.” By the end, some have been broken by the discoveries made.
Drury lets the actors and the characters bleed into each other more and more deeply as they investigate the play through improvisa- tion. When they finally lose themselves in their art, the effect is chilling. The final moments may not be as shattering as they could be, but all of the actors invest fully in the material, capturing the rawness of fear and hate.
The playwright also has a heyday with the masturbatory nature of the actor’s process, the games and the grandstanding. Callender wisely lets these comic interludes, which range from snippets of “Edelweiss” to cat impersonations, give us a breather from the hard lifting of the play’s dueling dialectics.
“Presentation” pivots between light and dark with startling dexterity even as it crescendos in a disturbing ritual, right out of Genet, that pulls them all into chaos.