If you’re in the mood for some serious decolonizing after the Jeanine Cummins American Dirt backlash, Isaac Gomez has you covered. In The Leopard Play, or Sad Songs for Lost Boys, now in a blistering and poignant world premiere at Steep under Laura Alcalá Baker’s direction, Gomez returns to his own roots in El Paso—a border city that not only reflects the many cracks and divisions running through our national identity right now, but that is also internalized by the character identified as “Son.”
I won’t pretend to know how much of Gomez’s story comes directly from his own life. But what he’s crafted here is a story that demands that we, as well as Son, begin seeing the men in this play as more than embodiments of toxic masculinity. These are men who are capable of great sacrifice in the face of their own fears.
Through 3/14: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Steep Theatre, 1115 W. Berwyn, 312-458-0722, steeptheatre.com, $39 reserved, $27 general admission, $10 access (“students, artists, whomever”).
