Charlayne Woodard in Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' War
Photo: Erin Baiano
Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' new play War, from Lincoln Center Theater's LCT3, begins in a hospital room, with two women sitting vigil over what seems to be a mannequin/patient in intensive care. It soon becomes apparent--from the phone conversation Joanne (Rachel Nicks) is having, and from the almost immediate arrival of her brother Tate (Chris Myers)--that this is going to be one of those children-dealing-with-dying-parents plays. Except that we quickly learn that the middle-aged Elfriede (Michele Shay) is a stranger to the two twenty-something siblings--but introduces herself, as best she can in an undetermined language, as the patient's sister.
The playwright soon brings on Tobias (Austin Durant), the sister's son--who looks very much unlike the others and more like a Rumanian gypsy--and Joanne's all-white husband Malcolm (Reggie Gowland). After which, the bedridden mother floats across the downstage area, introduces herself to us (the audience?), forgets where she is, and reintroduces herself to us while her dummy version remains in bed. We are immediately struck by this because Roberta is played by the wondrous Charlayne Woodward, of Ain't Misbehavin' and The Night Watcher, who is seen all-too-infrequently on the New York stage. Soon thereafter, everybody seems to turn into apes, with the grunting of head ape Alpha (Lance Coadie Williams, who also plays the head nurse) translated into supertitles which we--and Roberta--can read on the rear scrim.
When Roberta asks why, Alpha simply says (or rather is interpreted on the scrim to say): Because.
In anyone else's hands, we might by this point be running for the exits. (Does anybody here remember Prymate?) But this is Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, the intriguing young author of An Octoroon and Gloria, plays we are still talking and musing about. Sad to say, War doesn't quite succeed to the extent that those plays did; there is too much that is too hazily rendered. While part of the art of the playwright is that he regularly leaves us with open questions, his prior plays did not leave us scratching our heads--as some might do with all those apes.
War, as a concept, is indeed vital to this play. While it takes place mostly in a current-day Washington, D.C. hospital room, World War II is central to the fortune amassed by Roberta's father as well as to the mystery of that possible second family. What's more, Joanne seems to have spent a great deal of her life at war with Roberta. And in the course of the action, they all seem at war with each other. The play ends with the characters aligned, peering out at--who? The apes? The future? The audience?
War has been directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz, who with Red Speedo at NYTW, Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again at Soho Rep, and War--all opening in New York within three months--has established herself on the Intriguing Young Directors list. The scenery comes from Mimi Lien of Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 and Annie Baker's John, who seems to be everywhere of late. 
Chris Myers and Rachel Nicks in Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' War
Photo: Erin Baiano
The cast of seven does well, especially Nicks as Joanne, Myers as Tate, and Williams as what seems to be the king of the apes. Prime honors, though, go to Woodard. She is acting in limbo--her character is in a coma, which leaves her outside the story and in some ways watching the proceeds like an audience member--and one could say that her performance is key to making the play work, in this production at least. (The role was played by Tonya Pinkins in the initial production at the Yale Rep in 2014, with the same director but different designers and actors.)
War is, indeed, provocative and thought-provoking. But I left Jacobs-Jenkins' Gloria wanting to rush back and see it again. I left War wanting to go back and see Gloria.
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The LTC3 Production of Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' War opened June 6, 2016 and continues through July 3 at the Claire Tow Theater