A smart, rueful comedy of genuine substance, Meet the Cartozians probes racial identity then (1924) and now (2024). Specifically regarding Armenian people living in America, the play further remarks upon general racial perceptions coloring America today. The first part delivers agreeably dramatized history while the second act is fictional, sharply funny and meaningful.
Second Stage Theater’s premiere of Talene Monahon’s new play, which opened Monday, is straightforwardly directed by David Cromer and skillfully enacted by an outstanding six-member ensemble sparked by Andrea Martin being droll and authentic as two contrasting women of Armenian origin. A thought-provoking dramatic comedy on a painfully topical issue, Meet the Cartozians shapes up as a significant contender for a Pulitzer Prize as well as other awards come spring.
The play’s historical first section, a real life story, unfolds during several scenes in the handsome home of Tatos Cartozian, a middle-aged survivor of massacres in Armenia and by 1924 a prosperous “oriental” rug manufacturer residing with his family in Portland, Oregon. When the federal government tries to revoke his citizenship in a test case citing new racial restrictions on immigration, Cartozian hires legal counsel to argue that Armenians should be considered as white rather than as Asian people (in those days forbidden entry into the United States) and thus eligible for citizenship.
[Read Bob Verini’s ★★★☆☆ review here.]
As an Irish-American lawyer meets with the Cartozians to strategize their case to prove their whiteness, the particulars of those racist laws are explained even as the members of the family offer their perspectives. The attorney is helpful and tries to be sympathetic, but betrays his own prejudices as he questions the family’s religion and customs.
One afternoon a century later in southern California, prominent members of the Armenian-American community are participating in the Christmas episode of a hit Netflix reality series that stars the most famous woman in the world (next to Beyonce), who recently discovered her roots. Awaiting the celebrity’s late arrival, their increasingly bickering talk about genocide awareness, cultural displacement, the 2030 census and similar concerns devolves into raging arguments about racial identity (“Are you calling me a Turk?”) that prove both seriously eye-opening and wickedly funny. Meanwhile, the segment’s camera operator — another nice but distrustful Irish-American fellow — googles up conflicting facts that ignite more rancor.
A playwright of Armenian descent, Monahon previously neatly melded history with fiction in How to Load a Musket (2020). Similarly, in the more ambitious realism of Meet the Cartozians, Monahon gives viewers complex information through easy, conversational talk among identifiable characters. No spoiler, Monahon generously provides a genuinely sweet coda to mitigate a bit the comedy’s poignant essence.
Trusting his exceptional company of actors to persuasively depict people of different eras and manners, Cromer presents the play unobtrusively within the wide, deep, 295-seat Irene Diamond Stage of the Pershing Square Signature Center. Two contrasting domestic environs are designed by Tatiana Kahvegian; the Portland rooms are exquisitely lighted with a misty quality by Stacey Derosier suggesting bygone times, while camera gear, blank reflecting panels and a fake Christmas tree clutter the present-day living room.
Aptly dressed for yesteryear and today by Enver Chakartash, the ensemble offers solid, distinctive performances. Always an audience favorite, Andrea Martin first appears totally authentic as a commonsensical old world grandma who reads the future in coffee cups and then she raises laughter as an opinionated senior citizen not to be trifled with. Nael Nacer lends a dignified presence to his Tatos Cartozian and as a longtime civic leader. Will Brill gradually reveals an irritable streak that festers within the lawyer and the camera guy he portrays. Like their colleagues, Tamara Sevunts, Raffi Barsoumian and Susan Parfour create detailed characters who look as if their lives extend beyond the confines of a proscenium stage.
