With ‘Table 17,’ Douglas Lyons Reaches His Goals: Amusing and Charming the Audience

The performer, writer, and composer Douglas Lyons made his Broadway debut as a playwright three years ago with the comedy “Chicken & Biscuits,” a rollicking but distinctly middlebrow account of family dysfunction that suggested a lost Tyler Perry flick adapted for the stage.Mr. Lyons’s latest play, “Table 17,” wears its cinematic influences on its sleeve. In the script, in fact, he describes the sole female character, Jada, as possessing “a Nia Long/Sanaa Lathan Black love interest energy,” and Dallas, Jada’s former fiancé, as having “a Taye Diggs/Will Smith Black love interest energy.”Happily, Mr. Lyons and director Zhailon Levingston, also his collaborator on “Biscuits,” have recruited a pair of leading actors who prove worthy of those comparisons — and a third player who, in a couple of supporting roles, threatens to steal scenes from them on more than one occasion.The biggest draw for this production will likely be the luminous actress cast as Jada: Kara Young, who won a Tony Award earlier this year — after being nominated in three consecutive seasons, the first of which marked her Broadway bow — for running away with a high-profile production herself: Kenny Leon’s 2023 revival of “Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch,” ostensibly a vehicle for stage and screen star Leslie Odom Jr.Michael Rishawn and Kara Young in ‘Table 17.’ Daniel J. VasquezIf the role of Jada doesn’t present as exquisite a showcase for Ms. Young’s comedic gifts as her part in “Purlie” did, “Table 17” proves at once more relaxed and a bit sharper-witted than “Biscuits,” and offers all three of its actors ample opportunity to amuse and charm their audience.We first meet Jada and Dallas, who is played by a brightly affable Biko Eisen-Martin, individually, as they’re preparing to meet for dinner — at Dallas’s suggestion, which will become relevant later — more than two years after breaking off their engagement. Both are nervous; they try to pump up their confidence by primping to an R&B soundtrack: Chaka Khan for Jada and Usher for Dallas, who in his excitement resorts to the time-honored tradition of using his hairbrush as a microphone as he sings along.The play then moves to the scene of their reunion, a restaurant called Bianca’s, where a host named River holds court. Described in the script as “queer … and bitterly single,” River is a variation on the kind of wisecracking gay sidekick who pops up reliably in this kind of fare; as crafted by Mr. Lyons, though, and as played by a marvelously pungent Michael Rishawn — who also appears as one of Jada’s work colleagues, who becomes a romantic distraction — he provides the readiest laughs.Addressing another prospective diner who commits the carnal sin of turning up at Bianca’s without a reservation, River deadpans, “I can’t pull any strings. I’m not Geppetto.” When Jada turns up while Dallas is in the restroom, and asks if her ex- looks good, River quips, “Does corduroy look good after fifth grade?” He adds, “I have several questions, but I dare not ask.” And on it goes, quite pleasantly, through just less than 90 minutes, which are interspersed with flashbacks that flesh out Dallas and Jada’s relationship history. A twist toward the end is entirely predictable, but it doesn’t matter: Messrs. Lyons and Levingston aren’t trading in suspense here, any more than they’re trying to uncover new insights into the mysteries of the human heart.“Laugh openly with us,” Mr. Lyons writes in a program note. “Love with us. Let this play remind you of that ex you wanna strangle and that one love you’ll never forget.” It’s a simple agenda, utterly devoid of pretense, and the playwright and his cohorts accomplish their mission with irresistible flair.

With ‘Table 17,’ Douglas Lyons Reaches His Goals: Amusing and Charming the Audience

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