‘Emperor Jones’ revival is crowned for innovation

Take King Lear, relocate him to an island in the Caribbean, change his skin color, and take the writing reins out of William Shakespeare’s hands and put them in the more than capable hands of Eugene O’Neill.

The result of such an experiment in 1920 produced the groundbreaking “The Emperor Jones,” notorious in its time for being one of the first plays to feature an African-American actor, rather than a white actor in blackface, as the protagonist. Now, courtesy of the Irish Repertory Theatre, an absolutely riveting, expressionist revival has returned to New York, delivering the same emotional knock-out that “King Lear” did upon first viewing.

Set on an unnamed, French-colonized Caribbean island, the play starts with the island’s native inhabitants planning a coup d’état against their imperialist and supposedly divine autocratic dictator, the aptly named Brutus Jones—a convict who fled the States for a more luxurious life of exploitation. Having squeezed all the natural resources from the island and its people, Emperor Jones takes his money and flees into the jungle, where he encounters trials and tribulations reminiscent of the last temptation of Christ.

Mixing ingenious costumes, puppetry, and a full utilization of every corner of the stage, director Ciaran O’Reilly takes both the audience and Jones on an expressionist ride down memory lane, forcing the Emperor to face the sins of his past and the immeasurable dangers of lusting for power.

Just as the quality of any production of “King Lear” relies on the actor wearing the crown, “The Emperor Jones” rests on the shoulders of its star, here played with ferocious tenacity by John Douglas Thompson in a career-defining performance. Armed with only a gun, Thompson commands the stage for its entire 80-minute running time, slowly falling apart as the play progresses. Breakdowns are possibly the hardest character arcs to pull off believably, but Thompson is meticulous in his performance, fully investing his entire body in the transformation in a way that forces the audience to feel Jones’ torturous journey.

However similar the two plays may be, “The Emperor Jones” is in no way a simple derivation of “King Lear.” In fact, the play is a work of immense importance in the history of modern drama. Besides the fact that this was one of the first plays to star an African-American actor and that it cemented O’Neill as a master dramatist, the play is also a shining example of the modernist movement seen in American theater in the early 20th century. While God’s presence in “King Lear” is hard to avoid, O’Neill and other playwrights of his time reacted to such stories by crafting plays in worlds in which God is nowhere to be found. As Lear calls to the heavens, thunder and lightning ring throughout the theater. When Jones begs God for forgiveness, there is an almost eerie silence. “The Emperor Jones” paved the way for future god-forsaken works such as “Waiting for Godot” by featuring human-focused stories in which God had no part in the proceedings.

Humans are left to their own devices, which results in such tragedies as “The Emperor Jones.” In a world that has just seen a previously colonized Caribbean island wrecked by a natural disaster, “The Emperor Jones” reminds audiences that humans are more than capable of enacting their own travesties when acting solely to benefit the self.