Tuesday, January 13, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

'Madea's Class Reunion' barely worth the time

Tyler Perry, the 33-year-old author/composer/lyricist/director/producer/star of "Madea's Class Reunion," which visited the Aladdin over the weekend for a three-performance run, claims in a press release, "Before I write a show I pray. I say, `God, what do you want me to talk about now?' ... He said, `Speak to grandmothers who are raising their children's children. ... Treat these children well, because they know not who they are raising.' "

Amazing, isn't it, that God would use "they" as a misplaced pronoun?

Based on the results, I doubt it was God talking to Perry. It was more likely Perry's accountant. "Madea's Class Reunion" is a dismal work, a cross between a lame black UPN sitcom and a stale "Soul Train" episode. But it has enough easy jokes and applause-getting oversinging to get a rise out of those who are starved for entertainment that speaks to blacks.

And Perry is shrewd in his dealings with his audience. Several times during the course of the evening we were invited to go to the lobby and purchase videos, souvenir booklets (celebrating Perry's 10 years in showbiz), CDs, T-shirts and a calendar. If you didn't feel like walking back to the lobby, no problem, there were hucksters hawking the wares in the auditorium. ("Videos? Videos here. Videos?")

The show itself -- upstaged by the flea-market atmosphere -- doesn't have much to do with a reunion. It's more about sets of lovers meeting in the lobby of a hotel to sing about their troubled relationships. Most of the wail and woe has to do with how bad the man treats the ladies. Stephanie (Cheryl Riley) is a prostitute, but lest we judge her, she's a bad girl only because her husband (D'wayne Gardner) beats her. Diane (Judy Peterson) has no self-confidence, but that's only because her hubby is a lowlife skirt-chaser (Selmo), who won't kiss his wife in public. Only one woman is faulted in a relationship. Trina (Pam Taylor) cheated on her husband (Terrell Carter) three months ago, but it winds up the husband is so cold and self-absorbed that we quickly understand why the apologetic wife was driven to do the nasty. As a playwright, Perry is full of sympathy for the woman whose man has done her wrong. But he doesn't seem to have much understanding -- or interest in -- the curious discontent of his male characters.

Perry places all this serious action in a broad, comedic frame. In Act 1, he plays a goofy bellhop who observes and pokes fun at the characters who come and go. In the second act, Perry is in drag as the droopy-breasted Big Mama Mabel Madea, who frequently interrupts the play with a series of comic monologues about love and life. This blend of improvisational sketch comedy with intense domestic drama makes for one very confused evening. It's sprinkled with a series of generic pop songs (backed by a four-member band) that seem designed not to deepen the story but to "stop" the show with a series of Jennifer Holiday-ish scale climbings.

The production was occasionally made bearable by the considerable talents of the cast, nearly all of whom are worthy recording artists. And Perry proved himself a first-rate comic personality, whose gifts might be more conspicuous if he'd get rid of his director, author, composer, lyricist and producer.

Firing yourself multiple times isn't easy, but I've heard you gotta be tough if you want to make it in show business. I think it was God who told me that.