Theater review: ‘Topdog/Underdog’ a stunning exploration of being Black and male in an unforgiving USA

By Dave Kempa | Solving Sacramento “Topdog/Underdog” at Celebration Arts features Conrad Crump (in yellow) and Donald Lacy III. The show runs until June 30. Imani Mitchell, Solving Sacramento What makes the man? Is it the clothes he wears? His sexual prowess, or capacity for violence? The amount of money he has, or the way he attains it?& Or is it his capacity for love and support? Over two decades after playwright Suzan-Lori Parks’ “Topdog/Underdog” opened off Broadway to immediate acclaim, it is striking how her Pulitzer-winning drama — which the New York Times in 2018 called the best American play in 25 years — continues to capture and distill the here and now. “Topdog/Underdog” is a two-man performance following the relationship between brothers Lincoln and Booth (named by their father after the former US president and his assassin “as a joke”), as they navigate poverty, family history, romantic relationships and the Black experience together in a seedy apartment they can scarcely afford. Melinda Wilson Ramey, director of Sacramento’s Celebration Arts production of “Topdog/Underdog” — which runs until June 30 in its intimate 100-seat theater — first saw the play as a graduate student in New York City in 2002,...