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Like all superheroes, the unseen title character in The Chameleon has a gift: the ability to blend in with her surroundings to survive and emerge at just the right time to fight injustice. Jenny Rachel Weiner’s new play, receiving its world premiere at Theater J under the direction of Ellie Heyman, is not about the Chameleon, a comic book character getting the big-budget cinematic treatment within in the world of the play, but about what she represents to a Jewish family caught in the awkward dance between assimilation and self-acceptance. At its best, The Chameleon dramatizes that dance through the trials of its central character; its poignance, however, is often lost in a broad representation of the conversation about representation.
The Chameleon centers on Riz (Dina Thomas), a Jewish actor who recently scored the lead in the blockbuster adaptation of The Chameleon comics directed by the biggest name in Hollywood. Riz returns to the family home to celebrate her breakthrough with her father Mitch (Eric Hissom), mother Val (Sarah Corey), Bubbe (Nancy Robinette), and husband Joaquin (Ryan Sellers). The only person less than thrilled is her sister Stephanie (Emma Wallach). It’s Christmas, and the table is set with Chinese food and secrets: Riz and Joaquin are expecting, while Stephanie is planning a big move with her partner, Maya (Arielle Moore). As the parents make a fuss and the siblings renew their rivalry, Riz’s big break and the security it promises are thrown for a loop: The celebrated director helming the film is revealed to be a neo-Nazi. This sends the family into a tailspin and summons Riz’s erratic young agent, Philip (Rj Pavel), into the increasingly manic mix. Complicating this PR fiasco is the fact that Riz has never presented as a Jew in public, much to her family’s chagrin. This leaves her with a choice: Reveal herself and take a stand, or stay hidden and cling to the life-changing opportunity she has been waiting for.
It is obvious from the first exchange that the characters in The Chameleon are finely attuned to the legacy of Jewish erasure (and self-erasure) in popular culture, not to mention the political complexities of contemporary Jewish life—a subject made, unwittingly, all the more pointed by fresh and ongoing violence in Israel and Palestine. Yet how this affects Riz specifically is subsumed by well-worn talking points mixed with a gentle nudge at Jewish stereotypes—a mother who pushes food, a father who harkens back to his immigrant ancestors—and farcical hijinks. This reach for satiric insight and knowing laughs quickly casts the family as talking heads and comic foils. Stephanie and Maya, for example, are the youthful, pro-Palestine progressives arguing for Riz to take a stand on social media; Mitch pontificates on the real-life Jewish contributions to the genesis of superheroes as we know them. As the archetypal Gen Z rebels, Wallach and Moore have little to play with but overeagerness and sanctimony, while even the dependable Hissom is nearly lost in a cycle of paeans and lectures. Corey’s fussy Val and Sellers’ nervous and increasingly intoxicated Joaquin are fitfully funny, while Pavel’s hyperactive Philip is an obvious channel for Hollywood elites looking to cover their own asses.
Intriguingly, what begins as a manic dinner party verges into the surreal as Riz’s predicament grows increasingly fraught through social media engagement and even brushes with real danger. The shift is accentuated by the production’s accomplished scenography and lights, which are dominated by Andrew R. Cohen’s beautiful set, each room of which is marked out by the stark white lines straight out of a comic strip. It’s a fitting backdrop for some sparsely used superhero interludes depicting Riz as The Chameleon tussling with her nemesis, each of which is richly lit by Ryan Seelig. The way the set decomposes over the course of the play—which, incredibly, happens all in one night—further speaks to Riz’s fractured sense of self and the family’s confrontation with violent antisemitism. While these stylistic shifts clash with the (mostly) controlled chaos of the family meltdown, they do pull on the psychological acuity of Riz’s predicament and the escapism that superhero fantasies offer.
Indeed, the play really shines when it makes the weight on Riz’s shoulders keenly felt, particularly when cast in the shadow of The Chameleon and compared to her Bubbe, who aided Poland’s resistance to the Nazi occupation by blending in. As Riz, Thomas earns laughs for evoking the vanity, insecurity, and desperation of an actor in the last chance saloon. Yet she also delivers a moving performance in the few moments when she engages with Robinette’s addled but still forceful Bubbe, whose reversion to speaking Yiddish elegantly points to a cultural heritage that has endured its own fight against erasure. Watching Riz try to live up to these two legacies, against her own selfish desires supercharged by a resolutely selfish Hollywood system, makes the complexities of her situation far more tangible than any rendition of politically inflected family arguments over the dinner table.
Even then, Riz’s apparent affection for the Chameleon as a relatable hero and underappreciated icon comes so late to the party, after so many Twitter diatribes and frantic efforts to save face, that it’s hard to take seriously at first. In short, though its titular hero is an apt metaphor for Jewish resilience, this Chameleon’s key moments do not yet emerge to full effect.
The Chameleon, written by Jenny Rachel Weiner and directed by Ellie Heyman, runs through Nov. 5 at Theater J. theaterj.org. $69.99–$90.99.
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