Review: Goodman’s ‘Oscar Wao’ hits with gale force winds
Science established long ago that trauma can be passed down through the generations as surely as skin color. That merciless, inescapable bit of biology lies near the rapidly pounding heart of Junot Diaz’s Pulitzer-winning novel “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.”
Marco Antonio Rodriguez’s Spanish theatrical adaptation has been a hit for New York City’s Repertorio Espana, where it opened in 2019. Rodriguez is now presenting an English language version, getting its world premiere at the Goodman through April 12. The work is a wild, eye-popping romp where drama, tragedy, comedy, history and a huge helping of pop-culture collide in the story of the titular nerd.
Oscar’s life might be abruptly terminated (this is not a spoiler — it’s right there in the title), but it encompasses generations of history centered on the Dominican Republic. Here, history slices up the future like a scythe perpetually swinging between past and present.
Under the direction of Teatro Vista Artistic Director Wendy Mateo, the journey through familial and global history is a dazzling, upsetting, affirming trip where beauty and brutality are as inseparable as light and shadow. Throughout, magical realism flickers like a sparkle of fireflies as fantasy and reality smash together.
Oscar is a nerd of the first order, and throughout “Oscar Wao,” the audience is immersed in Wao’s obsession with comic books, Nintendo and Tolkien. Art history and western literature references also abound. From He-Man to John Singer Sargent’s infamous portrait of “Madame X” to the works of Oscar Wilde, it’s a fabulous ride.
The adaptation needs slight tweaking. There are several intense, anguished moments that would hit harder if shortened. And while the seven-person ensemble contains multitudes, the global sweep of the plot sometimes feels a little underpopulated.
Unfolding between the 1970s and the mid-1990s, “Oscar Wao” follows the titular character (Lenin Izquierdo) from love to death. His mother, Beli (Yohanna Florentino), is a Dominican who fled the island before his birth and a firestorm of maternal protectiveness and unresolved trauma.
Despite the violence that defines his family history, Oscar is unshakable in his childlike belief that love will always prevail. It’s a credo he clings to even as the terrible beauty of the Dominican Republic’s sugar cane fields rise like prison bars around him, their choking stalks a reminder of centuries of enslavement there, and the genocide of the indigenous Taíno people.
As Oscar, Izquierdo is endearing, heroic and just a little not-of-this-world. Faced with staggering violence and heartbreak, his optimism seems to come from somewhere distant, a world where cynicism isn’t an almost unavoidable side-effect of simply being alive.
But Oscar’s commitment to love-at-all-costs lives in tandem with his terror of the “fukú,” or curse, that has stalked his family for generations. Beli angrily dismisses the idea, but the generational events surrounding the family argue otherwise.
Oscar’s world shifts when he arrives at Rutgers University. His roommate Yunior (Kelvin Grullon, a charismatic blend of swagger and sympathy) becomes a lifelong friend. Oscar’s sister Lola (Julissa Calderon), who is an activist with a killer mohawk and stellar statement fashion, takes up with Yunior in a tempestuous relationship that’s never less than electric.
“Oscar Wao” straddles the known world and in the world beyond the veil through La Inca (Rossmery Almonte), a seer and healer whose wisdom seems to transcend the mortal plane. Almonte grounds the character in both worlds – she’s a spiritual cousin to August Wilson’s mythical Aunt Ester.
Finally, all importantly, there’s the unseen dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, whose 30-year reign over the Dominican Republic was marked by mass slaughter and an exodus of millions. Trujillo was assassinated in 1961 — more than a decade before “Oscar Wao” begins — but his shadow looms over every aspect of Oscar’s life and death.
The design elements are outstanding. Costumer Raquel Adorno deepens the characters down to the smallest details: Lola’s gold bamboo hoop earrings, Yunior’s “Scarface” T and immaculate sneakers, Oscar’s Charlie Brown-adjacent striped shirt.
Regina Garcia’s set is a minimalist world framed by Stefania Bulbarella’s comic-style projections of fiery planets, whirling constellations and unbreakable superheroes.
Like James Joyce’s “Ulysses,” “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” has enough subtext and cultural references to launch a thousand dissertations. Some of it’s overt, some of it’s embedded. Either way, it makes for a drama that’ll sweep you up like a whirlwind.