Theater takes up-close look at race

Lots of white people live in the quiet, middle-class neighborhood of Jefferson Park on Chicago's Northwest Side. A homogeneous community settled primarily by immigrants from central Europe, the area's latest demographic surveys report its population as 88 percent Caucasian. Hardly a place you'd expect to encounter a discussion on race, right?

Wrong.

This white enclave makes an appropriate, even inspired, setting for a provoking dissection of the issue, which The Gift Theatre delivers in its visceral, passionately acted production of J. T. Rogers' "White People," an unflinching meditation on race in America that unfolds almost literally in the lap of its audience.

One of the most striking things about director Michael Patrick Thornton's provocative, satisfying production is its immediacy. The Gift's narrow storefront at the corner of Milwaukee and Lawrence avenues gives new meaning to the words "up-close-and-personal." Therein lies the power of Gift's Chicago premiere of Rogers' candid confessional that early on conveys a sense of where it's going, but still manages to shock, surprise and shame. The small space allows the actors to hold the gaze of nearly every person in the room more than 90 minutes, establishing an essential connection with the audience. That intimacy forces us to recognize ourselves in the three characters confronting their own deep-seated prejudice (benign, overt, unanticipated) and struggling to understand and articulate it.

There's sympathetic Dr. Alan Harris (the affably awkward Paul D'Addario as the archetypal liberal) a history professor from New York City whose most promising freshman is a young black woman with the mind of a scholar and the attitude of a street heavy. He tells his story from a park bench covered in pigeon droppings in his Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood.

There's high-powered, Brooklyn-born attorney Martin Bahmueller (a brilliant John Kelly Connolly,) a self-made man frustrated by political correctness, whose custom tailored uniform can't mask his embarrassment at his humble origins. He fled New York for St. Louis and speaks from the safety of his high-rise office.

Lastly, there's homecoming queen turned dowdy housewife Mara Lynn Doddson (Anna Carini whose finely etched performance as a woman "clutching onto her pride" combines disappointment, defiance and frustration). Her cluttered Fayetteville, N.C., kitchen reflects her family's perch on the lowest rung of the economic ladder.

The play unfolds as monologues delivered against an American flag purged of color. It's an appropriate backdrop, considering how Rogers weaves together similar threads -- prejudice, guilt, frustration, anger and mistrust -- to produce an unflattering tapestry of white America. It forces Caucasians to acknowledge ugly truths they don't like to admit, to recognize they may not be as tolerant and enlightened as they imagine and to admit their capacity for rage is equal to anyone else's.

Characters echo each other. Their fear, guilt, self-loathing and sense of their own insignificance transcend class and gender. They are eloquent in their way, but all struggle with language, unable to find words to express themselves. Overwhelmed by violence, confused by new cultural norms, they ask "Why?" "What about me?" and "What do we do now?" and are dismayed the questions have no answers.

The artfully written "White People" benefits from credible, well-modulated performances from the Gift cast. From Connolly's self-righteous Martin, whose arrogance and barely contained frustration turns to helplessness when violence intrudes upon his insulated world; to Carini's resentful Mara, wondering when she gets her piece of the pie; to D'Addario's powerful performance as Alan, who understands the toll oppression takes on the oppressed but discovers after a particularly violent encounter, "this poison seeping up" and wonders "these thoughts, are they new?"

It's a question worth pondering and not just in Jefferson Park.

"White People"

Three stars out of four

Location: The Gift Theatre, 4802 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago

Times: 7:30 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays through March 1

Running time: About 90 minutes, including intermission

Parking: Street parking available

Tickets: $15-$25

Box office: (773) 283-7071 or www.thegifttheatre.org

Rating: Adult subject matter and language