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Lynn Nottage’s monumental 2015 drama ‘Sweat’ is one of the great twenty-first-century American plays, a working-class tragedy every bit as potent as anything written by Miller or O’Neill. Remorselessly tracking the disintegration of a proud factory town after the jobs go, its vision of a country collapsing into industrial decline and racial mistrust is harrowingly brilliant.
‘Clyde’s’ isn’t quite a sequel. But it’s certainly a companion piece, one that imagines the ‘Sweat’ world with a little hope sprinkled over it.
Those who did see Lynette Linton’s phenomenal 2018 UK premiere production at the Donmar will recognise the two plays’ shared character – Jason, played then and now by Patrick Gibson.
There is no need to have seen ‘Sweat’ first, but if you did, you’ll find Jason's circumstances aren’t hugely altered. After losing his job at the steel mill in his hometown of Reading, Pennsylvania, he was jailed for assaulting one of the migrant workers used to replace him at half wages. His face still has the white supremacist tattoos he took on in order to fit in in jail, though they have served precisely the opposite purpose since his release.
Now he’s the new kid at Clyde’s. It’s a Pennsylvania truck stop cafe run by Gbemisola Ikumelo’s eponymous owner, a woman whose behaviour frequently strays into almost comical malevolence, who nonetheless offers all her kitchen jobs to people who’ve served time and would struggle to find work otherwise.
It’s a drama about the hopes and dreams of Jason and his co-workers Letitia (Ronkẹ Adékọluẹ́jọ́) and Rafael (Sebastian Orozco); decent young people, whose lives have been blighted by the loss of jobs and the rise of cheap narcotics. And it might easily play out like ‘Sweat’ in a café were it not for the character of Montrellous, played by Olivier-winner Giles Terera.
A saintly, even Christlike figure – Rafael calls him ‘Buddha if he came from the ghetto’ – Montrellous is obsessed with the idea of creating the perfect sandwich. Not only that, he is obsessed with the perfect sandwich as a transformative ideal, and believes that Clyde’s – on the face of it an uninspiring greasy spoon – can be a conduit for greatness. If this sounds ludicrous, then Terera absolutely sells the role. Montrellous has the charisma of a general leading his troops into war, and an absolute belief in the ability of his young charges to better themselves by creating their own bread-encased culinary masterpieces. The scenes in which he simply goes around the kitchen asking everyone to throw out an idea for a sandwich are riveting, not to mention mouthwatering - for the love of god, eat before seeing it.
In contrast, Clyde just wants Montrellous to shut the fuck up and get on with making bland grilled cheese for undiscerning truckers. But her attitude goes behind pragmatism – as we’re deftly shown in a few seconds when Ikumelo’s Clyde lets her guard down, she has a fatalism and fear of the world that stops her dreaming; she won’t even take a bite of Montrellous’s extraordinary sandwiches because she cannot bring herself to taste the hope they represent.
But the fact is there are good people in the world, who can change things for the better, and while there may not be many Montrellouses, ‘Sweat’ has given Nottage the right to create one for ‘Clyde’s’.
Empathetically directed by Linton, it’s still a bittersweet play about the struggles of the working poor in an America that cares little for them. But it’s also a play that believes a better world might be possible. A radiant drama about love, hope and sandwiches.