A distinctive storyteller, John Leguizamo has forged an admirable 35-year career as an actor and writer based largely upon his series of award-winning seriocomic solo shows regarding life and times in the Latino communities around New York. In his latest work, The Other Americans, which opened Thursday at the Public Theater, Leguizamo challenges himself artistically by composing a two-act, seven-character, fictional family tragedy exploring serious themes about racism. The author challenges himself further by performing the leading role in his own play.
Set in the late 1990s in Queens, Leguizamo’s saga of a middle-aged businessman whose pursuit of the so-called American Dream proves ruinous presents a familiar tale. Leguizamo’s fresh angle argues how his Colombian-American protagonist, Nelson Castro, has been corrupted by a lifetime of striving against an oppressive white establishment that forces him into making petty deals and cheap fixes in running his small chain of laundromats. The man’s secretive, impulsive mindset is also revealed as harming his relationships with wife Patti (Luna Lauren Velez), his younger, wiser sister Norma (Rosa Evangelina Arredondo) and grown-up children Toni (Rebecca Jimenez) and Nick (Trey Santiago-Hudson).
In recent years, Nelson’s ambition caused him to remove his family from their comfortable Latino-peopled environs of Jackson Heights to snooty Forest Hills, where the white neighbors are unwelcoming. Nelson’s cute house, new swimming pool, and fancy wedding plans for Toni are symbols of success, but everyone looks anxious as the drama opens (as so many classic plays do) with a homecoming. Returning after a long stint in a psychiatric hospital is Nick, an extremely anxious 20 year-old whose mental issues stem from a physical assault he suffered because – no, let’s not further detail the play’s sorrows, but they certainly pile up.
[Read Melissa Rose Bernardo’s ★★★☆☆ review here.]
What actually proves more tragic about The Other Americans other than its gloomy tale is the way the play has been crafted in a remarkably conventional pre-World War II Broadway style. While its complex backstory explains and motivates unhappy doings later, the script is heavy with exposition and its characters usually tell their feelings rather than show them. Writing a drama in such strict kitchen sink-type realism involves major limitations: The vintage format does not allow any of the fluencies of flashbacks, direct address or fantasy to dramatize the story. Nor does the play deliver glimpses of those crucial, much-talked-about people who commit racist micro-aggressions and worse against the Castro family in offstage events. Meanwhile, individuals depicted onstage by Sarah Nina Hayon and Bradley James Tejeda have relatively little to contribute to the narrative.
From the elaborate good looks of the production stuffed into The Public’s semi-circular 275-seat Anspacher space, it appears that Ruben Santiago-Hudson, the director, was granted an ample budget to stage the play. Scenic designer Arnulfo Maldonado furnishes the Castro home, back yard and pool deck with scrupulously detailed realism down to the sofrito burning in a skillet.
Such sturdy visuals lend some credence to the performances led by Leguizamo, always a dynamic force; his proud, stubborn and increasingly desperate Nelson wears an ugly mustache across his face and hides an uglier secret inside his heart. A superficially charming but overbearing man insensitive to others, Nelson finally is revealed to be toxic. Had another author offered this showy role to Leguizamo, it is doubtful whether the actor would sign up to portray such an unsympathetic character. Velez provides a warm, loving presence as Patti, although she seems too sensible a soul to tolerate her husband’s ceaseless machinations. The other actors try their best to animate underwritten roles.
It is surprising that Leguizamo, whose solo works usually are very smartly shaped, chose to frame this sincere effort in such a fusty manner. It is curious that The Public Theater and Arena Stage agreed to co-produce his unwieldy drama, but likely they are supporting Leguizamo’s continued development as an artist, which is the right thing to do although it proves to be not so rewarding an experience for viewers.
The Other Americans opened September 25, 2025, at the Public Theater and runs through October 26. Tickets and information: publictheater.org
