Pasadena Playhouse’s production of Jonathan Spector’s Eureka Day, opened on September 10. The Tony Award-winning play follows a group of PTA parents at a private elementary school in Berkeley, CA, in the Fall of 2018, as they attempt to navigate a mumps outbreak at the school.
Using comedy to address controversial topics such as vaccine use, privilege, and PTA politics, Eureka Day poses important and timely questions about vaccine policies in schools at a time when the U.S. government has been unclear about vaccine and health guidance. However, the play fails to talk about the systemic health inequities that disproportionately plague Indigenous, Black, and Brown communities.
The comedy in the production of this play was strong as it presented the sometimes unfounded beliefs of those in favor of and against vaccines. The play also highlighted the absurdity of progressiveness when progressiveness itself fails to be inclusive. Parents in the PTA, for example, speak of using the correct pronouns when talking about students and opposing the use of disposable products, but constantly cut off Carina, the PTA’s only Black parent.
The set design was simple, yet pleasing to the eye with the various colors of children’s books, exercise balls, and classroom carpets. At the same time, however, the use of a large screen on the stage that projected chat messages during a video call felt unnecessary. When the PTA holds a conference call for all members of the community to weigh in on the school’s vaccine policy, chat messages are reflected on the screen for the audience to read. The cast on stage simultaneously has a conversation, but it was inaudible due to the audience laughing at the chat messages. It was unclear if the PTA conversation was meant to be heard.
Obie Award-winner Cherise Boothe was the only Black actor on the stage for much of the play. She played Carina, a mother who joins the school’s PTA for the first time. Throughout the play, we see other PTA members, mostly Suzanne, Eli, and Don — the white characters — constantly interrupt Carina as she tries to express her concerns about not initiating a vaccine policy for the school. While it is true that people of color, and women of color in particular, are often silenced and not given space to voice their concerns, I wonder what this play would have done for audiences had Carina been given an opportunity to express dissent for being silenced.
Yes, theater and art are meant to reflect the world we live in, specifically as it pertains to women of color being silenced, but theater also has the responsibility of imagining a world we should strive toward. Is it too much to ask of the theater to have a Black character occupy as much presence, if not more than a white character? I don’t believe so. What did a young Black girl in the audience learn from watching Carina? To be “polite” by remaining silent?
During the entire play, I had been waiting for Carina to have a bold, powerful, and confrontational moment in which she would stand up for herself and demand presence and space to voice her concerns, much like Meiko did toward the end. This, however, never happened.
And while Carina eventually expresses her concern about not instituting a vaccine policy at the school, she never provides specific reasons as to why one should be implemented. This “progressive” play is just below the threshold of being progressive. I would’ve liked to see characters in the play discuss the health inequities faced by Black and Brown communities, and by working-class communities, particularly as the inequities concern diseases.
As we’ve seen with COVID-19, the disease continues to affect Indigenous, Black, and Brown people disproportionately. I’m also not saying Carina should’ve been the character to bring forth such a concern; it could’ve been another character. People of color are often expected to bear the burden of explaining why certain practices are harmful or unacceptable (as I’m doing now), so having another character explain historical health inequities that diseases create would’ve been appreciated.
Eureka Day runs until October 5 at Pasadena Playhouse.
