Sharing Stoop Stories, New York Memories

Dael Orlandersmith captivated me Friday night at the Kirk Douglas Theatre with "Stoop Stories," a one-woman show featuring an intricate series of tales woven into a monologue and told on the steps of an imaginary brownstone in New York.

The centerpiece of Orlandersmith's performance is the unfortunate relationship between a poetic and intelligent African-American woman and a drug dealing African American man, though Orlandersmith danced skillfully through many different experiences in the play. The audience heard tales of tough teenagers led astray by drugs on Harlem and South Bronx streets, a Polish Holocaust survivor and as well as her own memories of weekly library trips, where others would tease her for being so studious.

When describing her childhood, she told us of her love for the written word.

"I was aware of how the light hit the books," Orlandersmith said, almost singing the words.

Interludes characterized by jazz and rock play a big part of narrating the story's timeline, with songs from Nina Simone, Bob Dylan, Ella Fitzgerald and CBGB. While dimming and changing the lights help the transition between her scenes, it is Orlandersmith's interactions during each exquisite bit that makes the performance eye-opening.

Despite the different stories and lives lived during the performance, the single, underlying message was clear and resounding: there was a stark difference between the life she wanted to live on the Lower East Side and reality in Harlem and the South Bronx. It was a story of childhood ambition, hope and promise, frustration and desire.

In all, "Stoop Stories" was more than worth the $20 a seat for such an intimate, meaningful piece of art.

There will be only four more performances of "Stoop Stories": July 10 at  2 p.m. and 8 p.m.; July 11 at 1 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.

Visit www.centertheatregroup.org or call 213-628-2772 for tickets.