Trouble in Mind

To hear LaChanze sing is like receiving a heavenly gift. That she's also an incredible actress makes any production she's in a sheer delight. Trouble in Mind is not a flawless play. What exactly is the meaning here of the title, taken from an old blues song about suicide? The story seems to ricochet from comedy to heartbreaking tragedy. But the cast is so superb, every moment plays out beautifully.

As Wiletta (LaChanze) converses with her friend, Millie (Jessica Frances Dukes), we learn about what it was like to be a black actress in the mid 1950's. The dialogue, based on the most ridiculously stereotypical white ideals about how "colored folks" spoke, is sprinkled with plenty of "Lord, have mercy" and "Yes ma'am" throughout. The seasoned vets, including the very impressive Chuck Cooper (as Sheldon Forrester) try to pass on their well earned wisdom to young John Nevins (Brandon Michael Hall), a very good-looking but green actor. He's also subtly warned not to get too involved with the young white ingenue, Judy Sears (Danielle Campbell). Judy's worst fear is that if  the show closes, she'll have to go back to living with her parents in Connecticut. The play they're working on is the "anti-lynching" melodrama, “Chaos in Belleville,” which Wiletta confides, "stinks." 

As any attempt she makes to have the play more realistic is shot down, we in the modern current atmosphere are left to wonder how much of this anguish Alice Childress felt when her play was denied a chance of opening on Broadway, when she stuck to her guns and refused to make the changes that were mandated when this play first came to life in 1955.