Fires In The Mirror

Fires In The Mirror is playing at the Signature Theatre located at 480 West 42nd Street. It runs one hour fifty minutes with no intermission. The play closes December 15, 2019.

Anna Deavere Smith is the playwright. She was nominated for a Pulitzer Of Drama in 1993 for Fires In The Mirror. Anna was nominated for two Tony Awards in 1994 for Twilight, Best Actress and Best Play.

The set has mirrors in the back of the stage and the ceiling which is slanted.

The first part of the play is broken into Identity, Hair and Rhythm. Actor (Michael Benjamin Washington) plays twelve different people.

After we meet the twelve people we are now in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York August 1991.

A Lubavitch (Orthodox Jew) van jumps the curb and kills a seven-year-old Black boy Gavin Cato. They were hit by another car causing the accident. In retaliation that night a Jewish scholar from Australia is killed. Things heat up even more when the driver is not change for the accident.

Actor plays fifteen more people. As we meet these people seventeen other people names are mentioned.

The name of the person who is before you appear on the mirrored wall behind them and who they are. For example, Angelis Davis-author, orator, activist. ”Rope”. The first half the people tell us something about themselves. The second part the people tell what’s going on and their reaction.

Carmel Cato is the last person. Father of Gavin Cato, Crown Heights resident, originally from Guyana, “Lingering”

This is a must-see play. Michael Benjamin Washington is mesmerizing in all twenty-seven roles. He does an impressive performance.

Review by Rozanna Radakovich.

Photos by Annazor.

To read candid interview with the cast, scroll down to the left for photos. Click on photos for this and other shows.