“Appropriate,” the last play to open on Broadway in 2023 and one of the best-acted productions of the year, tells the story of a dysfunctional family who reunite after the death of their patriarch to auction off all his possessions, during which we learn little by little how messed up each and every one of the characters is. But Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ resonant play also in its own wry and sly way tells a dark story of race in America. If what’s going on beneath the mordant humor on the surface is not always clear, we’re given plenty of clues that encourage us to assume, and try to root out, a deeper meaning, starting before the first line is even spoken: Projected on the stage are six dictionary definitions of the word “appropriate,” including an adjective that means proper, and a verb that means to steal.
The first characters we see are a man and a woman stealing through a window into a big old house that in the dark looks straight out of a horror movie. These are Franz Lafayette (Michael Esper), the youngest son of the deceased owner of this former plantation home in southeast Arkansas, and his girlfriend River (Elle Fanning, making her Broadway debut.)
Franz is first surprised by his nephew Rhys (Graham Campbell) who happens to be sleeping on the couch near the window, and then by his older sister Toni, Rhys’ mother (Sarah Paulson), who explodes when she sees who it is: ‘No one knows where you’ve been for the last ten years! There are lawyers trying to find you, Frank! Where have you even been?! What is going on? And what exactly are you doing here now? What are you doing?”
As the play unfolds, we get the answers to those questions, some of them disturbing – he was in effect run out of town because of a scandal – some of them ambiguous: Is he back to make amends, as he claims, or in hopes of getting his share of his father’s estate, as his siblings suspect.
His older brother Bo (Corey Stoll) rounds out what Bo calls his “family of nightmare disaster people,” along with his wife Rachael (Natalie Gold), and their two children.
It’s Rachael who by chance discovers an album of photographs in the house – of naked, dead Black men who had been lynched. What was their father doing with this? He spent most of his career in Washington D.C. as a liberal lawyer and jurist. It eventually emerges that the album could be worth a great deal of money, money that each of the characters could really use. Bo is about to be laid off. Toni is recently divorced and lost her job as a vice principal when a student to whom her son Rhys sold drugs died at a party
It’s a testament to the playwright’s craft that the photo album complicates the play rather than dominating it – adding more questions rather than making obvious points.
And it’s a testament to the performances under the direction of Lila Neugebauer that we can remain engaged with these not-very-likeable characters and their constant bickering and pile-on of troubles. Paulson, who was last on Broadway more than a dozen years ago, is able to find gradations in her anger and resentment, and let us into the hurt buried beneath. She also exhibits a rare technical skill of being able to yell angrily and still be clearly understood.
Elle Fanning’s River, who changed her named from Tricia, could easily have been turned into a caricature: She has a swami, wears hippy clothing. But both the writing and Fanning’s acting turn her into not just a human being, but a complicated one, somebody whose motives (like many people’s) are mixed, or unclear. Fanning has a memorable exchange with Alyssa Emily Marvin as Rachael’s 13-year-old daughter Cassidy that captures the playwright’s uncanny ear and helps justify the ambiguities and mysteries of “Appropriate.”
CASSIDY. Feelings aren’t facts and science is real.
RIVER. Oh, so you think science knows everything.
CASSIDY. Uh, it knows a lot.
RIVER. It doesn’t know why we laugh?
CASSIDY. Uh, we laugh because something’s funny.
RIVER. Yeah, but why does it come out like a laugh. Why doesn’t it come out like a scream or a sigh? Or why does water pour out of our face when we’re sad? Why do we dream? Science doesn’t have the answers to any of that.
CASSIDY. And you think ghosts are the answers.
RIVER. I think that the universe is full of mysteries that don’t necessarily all need solving. And maybe there’s a danger in knowing too much. And maybe the purpose of life is to simple marvel at its mysteries and perhaps, in the beholding, even deeper truths are revealed to us.
CASSIDY. Whatever…
Appropriate
Hayes Theater through March 3, 2024
Running time: two hours and 40 minutes including one intermission
Tickets: $139 – $340
Written by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
Directed by Lila Neugebauer.
Scenic design by dots, costume design by Dede Ayite, lighting design by Jane Cox, and sound design by Bray Poor and Will Pickens.
Cast: Graham Campbell as Rhys, Lincoln Cohen as Ainsley (alternate), Michael Esper as Franz, Elle Fanning as River, Natalie Gold as Rachael, Alyssa Emily Marvin as Cassidy, Sarah Paulson as Toni, Corey Stoll as Bo, and Everett Sobers as Ainsley (alternate).
