Theater review: Mother Road

                        

                                                     Cast of "Mother Road"

John Steinbeck’s Depression-era classic “The Grapes of Wrath” tells a heart-wrenching story about a family of farmworkers forced to move from Oklahoma to California in search of work.

Now San Diego Repertory Theatre presents “Mother Road,” Octavio Solis’ new  multiethnic, multiracial take on the story, and a plot that meanders and sometimes gets lost in several other directions.

It opens on a stage with two nude trees on either side of the stage and a virtual projection of country at the back. Several characters are scattered on the stage like a Greek chorus. They speak, noting that they are “not looking for heaven, just a place with less pain.”

Mark Murphey is excellent as current landowner William Joad (cousin of the paterfamilias), who has cancer and no direct heir (“I wasn’t the procreation’ type”). But he wants to leave the property to someone with at least family ties, and his attorney Roger (Jason Heil) has found in California the only direct descendant, a young Mexican American farmworker named Martín Jodes (Richard Jessie Johnson), scraping by on odd picking and landscaping jobs.

It seems the original property owner, the young Tom Joad, went off to Mexico and raised a family. “Tom was your first cousin,” he tells Martín. He also says “I’ve got the deed right here,” but he wants to assure himself that Martín is up to the task before turning it over.

The rest of the play is the Steinbeck road trip in reverse: William takes Martín from California back to Oklahoma. But this is a trip like no other.

There’s an imaginative jeep-like vehicle which cleverly splits when necessary and 

seats an alternating group of interesting, recognizable characters with noble (and less noble) attitudes. There are funny (and sometimes hostile) verbal exchanges. It’s just like real life. But most of these other characters and their subsequent adventures add time (the play runs two and a half hours with intermission) but not substance to the play.

The cast is excellent. Richard Jessie Johnson is perfect as the young, wiry Martín, who at last sees hope in his future.

Early on, Martín spies a woman who immediately steals his heart. This is Amelia (Celeste Lanuza), a lovely woman who seems to welcome his interest. Will they get together?

There is Martín’s sidekick Mo (Yadi Correa), a funny, mouthy lesbian farmworker who shares Martín’s reverence for the land. 

Several other actors play multiple roles. Heil plays four characters brilliantly. Sandy Campbell, Javier Guerrero and Rubin Rubio and Cedric Lamar all play multiple roles. 

There is much I like about this show. It does, however, seem a tad overlong and greatly overstuffed. Some judicious cuts are in order.

“Mother Road” plays through October 31, 2021 at San Diego Repertory Theatre. 

Wednesday at 7 p.m.; Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m.; Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m.; Sunday at 2 and 7 p.m.

For tickets: sdrep.org; box office (619) 544-1000