Race

No, I wasn't misled by the title and thought I was going to a play about athletics. This was definitely about race. But done in so much of a more intelligent way than the banal historic picture of white people being nasty to black people which so many middle-class white people will pay to watch to show they aren't racist.

If you were looking for a brand name for intelligent thought-provoking drama, David Mamet would be it. This short play (80 minutes) is set in an American lawyers' office where the two partners, one white and one black wrestle with whether they should take on the case of a rich white man accused of raping a black woman. The extra cog in the drama is the young black assistant lawyer. Thirty years ago this would be a play about the white man getting off because he was white and rich, and isn't that outrageous. This was a bout whether he would have a chance of acquittal, whether or not he was innocent. It covers the way jurors' minds might work, but also recruitment, positive discrimination. It is all just so much more intelligent and engaging. Really a play that kids should be reading now or going to rather than the endlessly re-cycled To Kill a Mockingbird. Embrace the new, not endlessly repeat the same old stuff.