"Stick Fly" on Broadway

The title of the new play, “Stick Fly,” by Lydia R. Diamond refers to the method by which scientists study fast-moving flies to examine their actions. Taylor, a central character in the play and an entomologist, explained that her mom advised her to study people as if they were bugs.

This young playwright has ambitiously tried to do too much in her intriguing play. The specimens in question are an affluent African-American family with a vacation home in Martha’s Vineyard. The father (Ruben Santiago-Hudson), Joe Le Vay, a prosperous neurosurgeon, has two well-educated sons. The eldest one, Trip (Mekhi Phifer), is a plastic surgeon and the youngest, Spoon (Dule Hill), has incurred his father’s disapproval by forgoing law school to become a novelist.

On this particular weekend, both sons have decided to bring their respective girlfriends home to meet their parents. Although dad is certainly judgmental and sarcastic, the brothers keep warning the girls about meeting their mother. Spoiler alert - one need only read the Playbill to realize that mom isn’t going to make it this particular weekend.

Spoon’s girlfriend, Taylor (Tracie Thoms), is irrepressible, effervescent and insecure. Her father, a famous social anthropologist, left her and her mother to begin a new family

Rosie Benton plays Trip’s girlfriend, Kimber, a white WASP. She is pretty, wealthy and coolly sure of herself. It’s hard to care about her, but even harder to understand her attraction to Trip. He exudes confidence, cockiness and sensuality, all of which Phifer possesses, but he remains totally two-dimensional.

Hill is wooden and stiff. The male roles (and in some part) the male actors, are of little consequence. Phifer is barely interesting, and as the ‘sensitive’ one, Hill is flat and ineffectual. Santiago gets to deliver some barbs, but there’s little movement of any of the male characters. They end pretty much the way they began.

In the background, often on the phone with her mother, the family housekeeper is Cheryl (Condola Rashad) who laughs jealously and reacts sarcastically. Cheryl remains somewhat in the background until the second act.