Sun Shines on Hartford Stage's 'Pike Street'
Nilaja Sun is best known for No Child..., her solo show based on her eight-year experience with arts education in New York City schools, featuring 16 characters, all of which Sun performed.
The play, which was presented at New Haven’s Long Wharf Theatre in 2010, follows Sun’s story as a visiting teacher in a 10th grade classroom at Malcolm X High School in the Bronx. (The play’s title alludes to President George W. Bush’s “No Child Left Behind Act” though Sun has stated that “the show is not a direct indictment on the governmental program, but rather a spotlight on great teachers.”
No Child... was performed nationally and internationally, and earned Sun an Obie Award.
Her latest work, Pike St. is also a deeply personal work, but this 80-minute, intermission-less solo show that she performs has an entirely different feel to it. The show, which premiered two years ago at off-Broadway’s Epic Theatre Ensemble and also played Berkeley Repertory Theatre, will be presented by Sun at Hartford Stage through Sunday, Feb. 2, directed by Ron Russell, who has staged past productions of the piece.
In Pike St., named after an actual street beneath the Manhattan Bridge, Sun vividly brings to life three generations of a Puerto Rican family and the vibrant inhabitants of on New York’s Lower East Side.
“Like No Child..., Pike St. takes on key societal questions with generosity, humor, and depth,” says Elizabeth Williamson, associate artistic director.
In the show, Evelyn is a single mother who fights for the survival of her family, struggling to hold her life together with both grace and humor. She cares for her immobilized daughter and supports her womanizing father, relying upon money from her brother who is serving abroad in Afghanistan. When he comes home, afflicted with PTSD, Evelyn fights for her family’s healing, redemption, and survival in the face of a threatening storm—both natural and man-made.
“It kind if shows us at our best, worst and craziest,” says Sun in a recent phone interview. “The work was inspired by the days when Hurricane Sandy came to town,” says Sun, who describes herself as “an actor who writes stories—and what a blessing it’s all been.”