How does a sincere but preachy play that’s been making the rounds in
the U.S. and Europe since 2008 finally get to New York and become a
must-see?
Star power. And Lupita Nyong’o, whose heartbreaking work in “12 Years a
Slave” won her an Oscar, and Danai Gurira, a writer and actress now
famous as the zombie-mauling Michonne on “The Walking Dead,” deliver a
double wallop of the stuff.
Between them, they’ve made tickets for the show at the Public Theater
hard to get. But it’s worth trying, especially for Nyong’o, whose
gripping and assured work oozes emotion and anchors this production.
Like Lynn Nottage’s “Ruined,” this drama follows women in the crossfire
of African civil war. In 2003 Liberia, captive women lead bleak lives
as unofficial wives of a rebel general. They’re job is to give sex on
demand. Awful. But they’re alive. Sort of.
