Before It Hits Home, Congo Square Theatre Company, at Chicago Dramatists. Half of this show is exceptional–Congo Square Theatre Company, a new group, bears watching. But after a surefooted setup, the play loses its way. A bisexual African-American jazz musician contracts AIDS, and no sooner is the revelation made to his family than everyone begins to shout and sob–and they all continue to do so for the rest of the evening. Director Anthony “Amiri” Edwards may have hoped to conceal playwright Cheryl L. West’s failure to develop her characters, but the result is that they simply erupt into stereotype: the weak gay man, the implacable matriarch, the father whose crust conceals boundless tenderness. And the unvarying volume of the second-act performances causes the audience to shrink away from characters they once embraced.
