Review: Play offers witty exploration of Latinidad
By hola | Published | No Comments
“Queen of Basel,” up now at the Studio Theatre, is based on a play written more than a century ago and reimagined today in the midst of the exclusive art market know as Art Basel (to which its name alludes).
Based on Johan August Strindberg classic drama “Miss Julie” (1888), the update retains its edgy social commentary, while making reference to Venezuela’s current political situation, U.S. immigration, cancer, the Holocaust, and such trappings of modernity as the paparazzi and Ubers.
The witty adaptation was written by Juilliard-trained Hillary Bettis, also known for her work on movies and TV series like the FX spy drama, “The Americans.” She wrote “Queen of Basel” for Miami New Drama, where it received a developmental production last year, before making its world premiere earlier this month in D.C., according to the Studio Theatre. It’s directed by José Zayas, a prolific director originally from Puerto Rico, who has also worked at GALA Hispanic Theatre in Columbia Heights and elsewhere around the country.
In the original script the action is set in the kitchen of Miss Julie’s estate. She is the daughter of a Swedish Nobleman. It’s mid-summer and the other characters in this love triangle are her father’s valet, Jean, and Christine, the cook. In Bettis’s version, the performance is staged in an industrial kitchen in a Miami luxury hotel during the annual Art Basel convergence of the super-wealthy.
The hotel is owned by the father of the protagonist, who is also named Julie (Christy Escobar). The other two characters are Christine (Dalia Davi), a waitress fleeing unrest in Venezuela, and John (Andy Lucien), an Uber driver. Christine offers to help Julie escape the paparazzi in hot pursuit of the hotel heiress.
Enter John, ready to pick up his next fare. He’s Christine’s Afro-Cuban fiancé, here to drive Julie to a safe location. But things don’t turn out as planned. Liquor begins to flow and the characters’ stories unfold, illuminating a diversity of latinidad in dialogue that moves fluidly between English to Spanish with sur-titles filling in the gaps.
Queen of Basel is an excellent dramatical catharsis for the Latino migration epic in America. It is playing through April 7 at the Studio Theatre in Northwest D.C.
—Roman Santillan
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