Colman Domingo and Sharon Washington in Wild With Happy, written...

Colman Domingo and Sharon Washington in Wild With Happy, written by Colman Domingo and directed by Robert O'Hara, running at The Public Theater at Astor Place from Oct. 9 through Nov. 11, 2012. Credit: Joan Marcus

Director Robert O'Hara, known as a playwright of subversive power, modulates his cast in the narrow range between bellowing and barking. Domingo seems straitjacketed as the sensible one, the Yale-educated gay son confronting cultural expectations about the funeral of his mother. Sharon Washington toggles boisterously between two roles, the mother and her sister. Maurice McRae finds a few new layers in the prototype of a flamboyantly femme friend. But the most original moments come from Clint Ramos' scenery, which appears to create life from caskets.

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