Fine Acting Carries ‘Mules’

Bridie, the mid-level boss in an international drug-smuggling ring, is as well-dressed, heartless and articulate as a villain in a James Bond movie. The only difference is she’s black, a woman and she believes she is haunted by a ghost.

Bridie preys on the poor women of London and the Caribbean in “Mules,” the episodic new play having its U.S. debut as the last work in the Mark Taper Forum’s New Theatre for Now series. Like Bridie, the play is a mixture of the usual and the unusual, the familiar and the unexpected. British playwright Winsome Pinnock clearly owes something to the plays of Caryl Churchill, particularly to “Top Girls” and “Fen.”

Yet despite some wonderful writing in parts, “Mules” is content to state the obvious. Poor women become drug-runners, or mules, because they have no prospects. Since they are on the bottom, they are more likely to get caught and go to jail.

If the play is uneven, the acting is not. Three women each juggle multiple roles with finesse, and they make a truly impressive ensemble.

Much of the credit goes to the director, Lisa Peterson, both for the actors’ fluid transitions between characters and for the use of the space. With the help of set designer Christopher Barrecka, Peterson has cleared away the stage, literally: The action takes place on a wooden platform, artfully lighted by Geoff Korf. This barren configuration makes the Taper feel more intimate and rougher, appropriate for the play’s settings, which include the London streets, a poor Jamaican neighborhood, a jail cell and a ganga (or marijuana) field.

The three actresses are onstage virtually throughout, making quick changes with only costuming accessories and by rearranging three wooden chairs. Gail Grate is fine as a well-heeled comrade of Bridie’s, but she is particularly bewitching as Lyla, a Jamaican woman who initially balks at using her body to transport drugs to London. No poor woman, however, can escape the honey-tongued Bridie (Saundra Quarterman) or her siren song of good clothes, a nice hotel and travel. Lyla finds out soon enough that the price for these luxuries is too high. After returning to a life of poverty in Jamaica, she eventually takes the less dangerous, lower-paying job of working in the sun in the ganga fields, her baby strapped to her back. Grate gracefully conveys that Lyla has kept her soul intact.

Bahni Turpin plays Lyla’s less fortunate sister, Lou, who ends up doing hard time. She has a tough-vulnerable quality that also suits her well in her role as a London street urchin. Quarterman is smoothly evil as Bridie. With her plotting and flattering and lying and smiling, she suggests a modern-day Richard III.

But alas, the ghost that Bridie believes is haunting her is too bald a symbol. The ghost is simply the conscience we always hope haunts the heart of so gifted a villain. Winnock, and in some cases Peterson, has a tendency to highlight what is already obvious. In one such scene (which is really second-rate Churchill), two women in a prison cell imagine they are escaping on the wings of a dove. As they stand on two chairs and stretch out their arms in Christ-like fashion, the whole play threatens to come crashing down from overstatement.

The narrative thrust looms in and out of view. The inevitable happens--poor women are lured into smuggling drugs and taking the fall. Bridie is eventually victimized. Some of this is handled well. The mugging of a runaway girl is truly chilling; a later attempted mugging of the same young woman has far less punch. The final scene, with two women working their arms in a swinging motion as they cut down the marijuana plants, is lovely and perfectly modulated.

With Bridie and her all-female mules, Pinnock depicts the ostensibly kinder, gentler language of a rough trade much explored in movies and books. Bridie woos her mules with faux female bonding lines such as, “I’ll be more honest with you than your own mother.” Pinnock is able to capture individual foibles quite well, but she draws the big picture more crudely. She exhibits a kind of naivete--she presents the perils of the drug trade as if it were news. The fact that her characters are female is rather new. But the lessons she teaches are ultimately unsurprising.

* “Mules,” Mark Taper Forum, 135 N. Grand Ave., Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2:30 p.m. Ends June 29. $29-$37. (213) 628-2772. Running time: 2 hours.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

“Mules,”

Gail Grate: Lyla, Rog, Allie

Saundra Quarterman: Bridie, Piglet, Rose, Bad Girl 2

Bahni Turpin: Lou, Sammie, Pepper, Olu, Bad Girl 1

A Mark Taper Forum production. By Winsome Pinnock. Directed by Lisa Peterson. Sets Christopher Barrecka. Costumes Candice Cain. Lights Geoff Korf. Sound Mitchell Greenhill. Fight director Steve Rankin. Production stage manager David S. Franklin.