Queer, Black student navigates intergenerational trauma in ‘Fat Ham’
‘Fat Ham’Through Jan. 14Studio Theatre1501 14th St., N.W.$35-$110Studiotheatre.org They say Juicy is soft. He’s been called other things too – generally miserable, not a people person, etc. – but since he was a kid, he’s mostly been called soft, a risky label in a family made up of dangerously violent men.
As the central gay character in “Fat Ham,” out Black playwright James Ijames’ Pulitzer-winning, dramedy currently enjoying an extended run at Studio Theatre, Juicy (Marquis D.
Gibson), a queer, chunky, Black college student, navigates a world of intergenerational trauma. He’s there to show how a young gay man might react differently to what life throws at him.
Inspired by Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” “Fat Ham” takes place in real time at a backyard barbeque in the American South rather than the dark corridors of Elsinore castle.
