Jitney. The Old Vic.

Jitney is not the best of August Wilson’s Pittsburgh cycle, but the Old Vic’s excellent cast draws out all its strengths.

15 June 2022 Press Night

August Wilson’s genius as a playwright lies in his ability to create vivid and believable characters, and then to listen what they have to say to, and about, each other.

In the case of Jitney, the characters comprise a group of variously ill-assorted African American drivers, and their comings and goings working out of an illegal taxi office in late 1970s Pittsburgh.

The cab office is located in a part of town so rundown that regular drivers do not dare go there, but the group still have certain standards that taxi-boss Becker requires them to live up to – No Drinking on The Job and No Cheating the Customers being the two most important.

Becker, who is something of a local community hero in that part of town, has a couple of major problems looming. The office is due to be knocked down in an upcoming urban renewal project and his imprisoned son is just about to get out of jail after a lengthy sentence for murder.

Aside from these two challenges Becker, in a standout performance by a remarkable Wil Johnson, has to manage bitchy gossip Turnbo, whose antagonistic relationship with ambitious Vietnam veteran Youngblood looks set to spiral into violence any second.

Alcoholic driver Fielding’s drinking is putting customers at danger, and illegal bookmaker Shealy is using the office for his own shady practices.

All-in-all, the situation is rife with dramatic potential and Director Tinuke Craig makes a great job of bringing out as much light and shade as he can. The dialogue is not always vintage Wilson, and the early career narrative sometimes feels clunky, but there is plenty here for a uniformly great cast to work on.

Parts of the play hint at the genius of later Wilson. In particular the extraordinary showdown between father and convict son Booster, powerfully played in the performance I saw by newcomer understudy, Blair Gyabaah, is as good a two-hander scene you are likely to see on stage this spring.

Alex Lowde’s excellent set comprises a huge panel running backwards from stage front to rear, in the centre of which is sliced, envelope style, a claustrophobic rectangular office space. It reduces the vast size to the Old Vic’s stage to something much more intimate, and its use of the kind of fake wood panelling so beloved of cheap American motels adds a tone that’s seedily appropriate to both time and place.

Worth seeing for the performances alone.

Leemore Marrett Jr Booster

Tony Marshall Fielding

Sule Rimi Turnbo

Geoff Aymer Doub

Nnabiko Ejimofor Shealy

Leanne Henlon Rena

Solomon Israel Youngblood

Wil Johnson Becker

Dayo Koleosho Philmore

August Wilson Writer

Tinuke Craig Director

Alex Lowde Set and Costume

Elliot Griggs Lighting

Max Perryment  Sound and Composer

Ravi Deepres Video

Duration: 2 hours 45 minutes. One interval.

Full Disclosure: I paid full box-office price for the ticket.