brownsville song (b-side for tray)

Catrina Ganey & Curtiss Cook Jr.

Philadelphia Theatre Company, located in the Suzanne Roberts Theatre, Broad and Lombard Streets, is presenting brownsville song, (b-side for tray) through May 31. This powerful and uplifting story of redemption stars Curtiss Cook Jr. as Tray, Sung Yun Cho, as his step-mother, Merrell, Catrina Ganey as his Grandmother Lena, Kaatje Welsh as his half-sister Devine, and Anthony Martinez Briggs as Junior. Playwright Kimber Lee insists we identify with each of the characters as they find their way around the morass that has become their lives.  Thanks to the boundless set design of  Scott Bradley, the actors are able to move in and out of the Gram’s house, the streets of Brownsville, Brooklyn, a Starbucks’ café and other unnamed locations with great ease as well as pass in and out of the present and the past as effortlessly as a piece of thread goes through the eye of a needle.  This is a soul-searching tell-it-like-it-is drama.  It is the story of the streets; a brutal tale of how a young golden gloves boxer with college aspirations comes to the realization that people deserve a second chance, only to have his taken away. Superbly acted by Curtiss Cook Jr. and Catrina Ganey, the final moments of this tale cry out for a rewind, hoping, perhaps for a different outcome.  As Lena begins, “No, you cannot begin this story here, with me….”, so too, is the urge to cry, “No, please don’t end this tale like this.” For more information or tickets, call 215-985-0420 or visit online at PhiladelphiaTheatreCompany.org.