Public Theatre Presents THE ALLY Review

A chair, a lamp, and not much else…

Itamar Moses’ ever-so-timely script fills the room with battling ideologies instead. Some characters carry the banner of intersectionality—where racism and the Palestinians’ struggle for survival combine. Other characters are Jews doing battle to define and claim Never Again to support their ideological persuasions. Ancient rumblings of anti-semitic tropes move in and out of audible range— perhaps more loudly for some than others. Add in Freedom of Speech, academic freedom of thought, and What-Aboutism. Finally, tune in that you are part of an audience seemingly eager to rush In with snaps, claps and other variants of huzzah.

We meet writer and part-time professor Asaf in an unnamed college in an unnamed college town. Born and raised in the Bay Area, an atheist and self-defined progressive, he is the son of Israeli emigrés, married to an Asian woman, and coincidentally now living in the same town of his African-American lawyer Ex. One of his favorite students, Baron, approaches him to become the titular ally, signing a petition to protest the police murder of his innocent cousin who did nothing more than be in the wrong place at the wrong time while being Black. There is a video showing the murder of Baron’s cousin— which Asaf never watches. He suggests he doesn’t need to watch the video to get it and to sign the petition.

The proverbial fly in the ointment is that the petition Asaf is asked to sign, coincidentally written by his Ex, includes a reference to the need for solidarity with the Palestinian cause using terms of apartheid and genocide. Swallowing his disquiet with this wording he signs anyway, which in turn leads to him becoming the sponsor of a new progressive Jewish organization that wants to bring a controversial speaker to their school.

Asaf, the ally, never watches the video of Baron’s cousin’s murder. It seems to become a metaphor for just how much he is willing or not to absorb Baron’s reality from the safety of his privileged remove. With Moses’ pen at work though, Asaf is not the bad guy. Just about everyone in the room has a cringeworthy blind spot, with the exception of Baron, a quiet hero in the background who finds room to take ownership of both his tribal instincts AND his emerging sense of complexities he has only barely tuned in.

Public Theatre Timing of the Production Astounds

This reviewer has reason to ponder if Moses’ script would engage as much if we were not seeing the play at the very moment when the world is watching the systematic starving and destruction of Gaza in real-time. Productions do not get more timely than this. You don’t walk into this play without a tribal identity— even if you think you don’t have one.

If you are drawn to the ideological wordy tomes of a George Bernhard Shaw type script The Ally will likely sate your appetite for such. If you like your theater more action packed with a clear dramatic trajectory The Ally will likely disappoint.

Like the characters in this script, we’re in an ideological boxing ring with all contestants soaked in blood and quaking in our tribal corners. If you don't think that applies to you...