Dallas Premier Productions’ C.R.E.A.M.- Cash Rules Everything Around Me
at The African American Museum Theatre at Fair Park in Dallas, Texas
Reviewed Performance on 3/20/2010, evening
by Laura L. Watson

Dallas Premier Productions’ recent one day only showing of C.R.E.A.M.- Cash Rules Everything Around Me at the African American Museum Theatre was by far one of the worst performances I have ever sat through. It was one of those painful, embarrassingly bad performances where everything that could go wrong did. However, I do not regret attending because it is an intriguing story, and I see the future potential of C.R.E.A.M. given better casting and a media suitable to the script. I would be the first in line to see it again after it was reworked.

According to flyers and their online web campaign, C.R.E.A.M. was inspired by Al Pacino’s movie Scarface, though this one line marketing ploy is confusing and misleading. C.R.E.A.M. is the dramatic tale about two sisters from Louisiana who are in dire need of money in order to bury their mother. They turn to a life of crime and quickly become entangled in the glitz and glamour that the Dallas gangster life offers. They soon discover, though, that it feeds more than their wallets as they fall deeper and deeper into this lifestyle.

Writer, director, producer, and artistic director Latoya Guy will be the first to admit she has a natural talent for writing stories but no real training or experience with turning these stories into theatrical productions. This coupled with an extremely low budget and a cast and crew of even less experience made what little she was able to do well seem somewhat miraculous. First, the play flowed more like a screenplay than a stage play. Short, choppy scenes at multiple locations made the staging at the African American Museum Theatre (which was not built with theatre productions in mind) nearly impossible and the set changes took longer than many of the scenes. If Guy wants to keep it a stage production, she needs to carefully consider the venue that could house it, lengthening the scenes and eliminating some of the locations. She should have used the various parts of the stage for the different locations rather than everything taking place at center stage. In blatant honesty, as it is currently written (and I believe, it is written very well), this should be a screen play for a feature film.

With her budget, space and crew limitations, she would have done well to remember that less is more. Rather than using dollar store props and set dressing, borrow quality items or find a way to do without. The plastic table cloths wrapped around furniture in an attempt to hide it, a bed made of only a sheet over shaky folding chairs and a slanted podium utilized as a bar full of breakable bottles were more distracting to the story than helpful to it. The costuming also left a lot to be desired and obviously came from the closets of the cast. I thought Sarge was wearing large, noisy dog tags because she was a sergeant in the army, but this was never explained. Also, the lack of time prohibited the actors from fully changing, so we had evening gowns pulled on over blue jeans and worn with tennis shoes. We never saw the father out of his bathrobe and hair net, including when he was walking the streets of Dallas looking for his daughters. This needed to be addressed in the script or the father needed to be wearing his “outside” clothes. More care and consideration of the characters, their backgrounds and their current goals would be appropriate. The African American Museum Theatre only offered sparse lighting design options, most of which consisted of on or off at center stage. Again, another venue with a larger backstage area and the ability to hang, focus, and color lights would be better.

After the show at an informal reception for cast, crew and friends, Guy told us that there were many technical disasters that fueled the downfall of the performance. There was suppose to be projected images serving as a backdrop on a large screen upstage of all the action which failed to work along with a musical sound track and sound effects. The audience did not miss any of these, other than when actors backstage improved sounds such as a door knocking or a cell phone ringing. What the audience DID pick up on, though, was the nervous energy from actors who were holding on by their fingertips. At one point, it seemed they were debating stopping the show, taking a 30 minute break and starting all over. While the old adage “the show must go on” won out, I can’t help but wonder if the night would have been improved with allowing them a simple “do-over.”

Guy’s choice to cast her show color blind (meaning without thought to race, ethnicity, etc) should be applauded, including the two sisters- one was white, the other black. However, she was blind to their overall lack of experience and inability to bring to life the characters. In her situation, she should have chosen actors whose experience was far greater than her own.

Destiny Washington as Bennie and Crystal Sanders as Sarge, the sisters, both started out strong only to show they lacked the training required to give a truthful performance. Washington had a lot of energy and gave an enthusiastic performance, but at times it felt like she was faking the emotions. She also needs to work on her projection and diction. Sanders is striking on stage. She is tall and thin with gorgeously long, thick hair. However, she seems to have only one way of delivering lines- loud and forceful. Though this sometimes worked for the character of Sarge- the violence happy sister- it became tiresome and I quickly lost interest in her. She came across as goofy and her lack of technique/training truly showed throughout this performance. Her weakest moment is when she went for laughs as Jet’s tormenter rather than going for a true psychotic break.

Moritz Williams was Sam, the assistant to the gangster who takes a love interest in Bennie (but settles for her sister as needed.) Williams is handsome and well portrays a smooth talking player. However, he is very soft spoken and not at all believable as a gangster. Rey Torres appears briefly in the beginning as the doctor who tells the sisters their mother has passed and then reappears throughout the play as Bennie’s stuttering boyfriend from back home, Jet. Based on the performance, it was no surprise his bio in the program is the most professional with the most experience. However, it was equally clear he was left to self-direct and his inability to do this showed. He was loveable as Jet and had a good handle on Jet’s speech impediment-though he became too soft spoken at times- to the point it was heartbreaking when Bennie broke up with him. But Torres left Jet as very one dimensional. I didn’t understand what he saw in Bennie nor did I believe he was going to give all it took to win her back. I think with a little more direction and the writer adding in more opportunities to see Jet and Bennie together at the beginning of the play (including a back story on their childhood romance), Torres would be an excellent casting choice.

J.R. Bradford was someone else who could be cast in the reworked production of C.R.E.A.M., though he struggled alongside everyone else. He was the FEMA Man, the first victim the girls were assigned to kill, and he also played their father. As the FEMA man, he had few lines, but skillfully kept himself busy on stage while the sisters discussed him. His death was meant to be dramatic but came across as comedic- more from the staging than from his acting. I saw a true fear in his eyes, though, that made me angry at the sisters and the senselessness of killing a stranger. As the father, though, Bradford mumbled and shuffled across the stage. He was far too young to play the father, and the few lines he had were not enough to truly allow him the opportunity to reveal the character. Josh Drake played Gos, the gangster who hires the girls to kill who he needs killed, and he made a hilarious but brief appearance as the jeweler who tricks Jet into spending all his money on an engagement ring for Bennie. As the flamboyantly gay jeweler, Drake showed his comedic timing and impersonation skills that he listed in the bio. As a gangster, though, he was not menacing or cold blooded enough. Also, by the time he appeared in the second act (revealed as the big time crime boss issuing these orders), the audience had lost interest and was laughing inappropriately thinking they were watching a farce instead of a crime drama. Instead of taking command of the stage and shifting the audience’s mind back to drama, he milked more laughs every chance he got. Finally, Erikia Clayborne played multiple, unnamed characters throughout the performance. She shows the most potential as a serious actress if she gets some much needed training and experience. As Bennie’s boss at the restaurant, she was mean and bitchy, though I never understood why. Then, she was the over excited sales assistant who helps the girls spend their new wealth, and she exited as the police officer the gangsters tortured for information. During her final scene, the fear was evident not only in her face and voice but throughout her body. She needs to work on her diction and to be careful of not over-acting, but she has a good grasp of how to distinguish one character from another in big and small ways.

As for the business side, Dallas Premier Productions needs to utilize local resources to help them. By simply following the program or playbill produced by any established community or professional theatre, they could have produced a program that would give the audience the information they needed- who played what character, the time and place setting, and the series of events along with more professionally structured bios of the cast and crew. Also, when marketing a new play, it is best to give at least an idea of what the story is about rather than a vague one sentence that alludes to someone else’s work. If you want people to attend your shows, they are going to want to know what they are seeing before they buy their tickets.

Dallas Premier Productions hopes to produce two or three shows a year, and with this start here with C.R.E.A.M., only Guy's second production ever, they are well on their way and can only improve with time.

Bias-
I met Latoya after the performance, and we have become fast friends. I have committed to helping her with this script and others in the future.
Rey Torres is a friend, former classmate from UNT and former castmate from another show. I had high expectations from him, given his experience and training. He offered me a free ticket to the show. I decided to review it after the performance based on my discussions with him and Latoya.
I had never been to the African American Museum Theatre before, nor had I met or seen any of the cast in previous work.