Escaping the past

We already know this, but it bears repeating: Not everyone who's in prison is a bad person. Some are, of course, but many people serving sentences wound up in jail because of where they grew up, because they suffered abuse or both.

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Marsha Norman's 1978 play "Getting Out" deals directly with this issue, which is, sadly, very relevant in an age of mass incarceration. The University of North Carolina Wilmington's Department of Theatre is staging a solid, often-compelling version of the show through Sunday in the Cultural Art Building's Mainstage Theatre. It's a dark, troubling tale, but ultimately less bleak and more hopeful than the play Norman is best known for, " 'Night, Mother," which won the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 1983 and is about a woman determined to commit suicide despite her mother's best efforts to stop her.

"Getting Out" will be the last play directed for UNCW's theater department by professor Anne Berkeley before her impending retirement. Berkeley has shown a tendency for selecting deep, often-edgy plays with a focus on social justice — including racial, youth and women's issues — and, like other work she's directed, "Getting Out" is nothing if not fascinating.

The story focuses on Arlene, who's played by Erin Sullivan with a believable mix of sadness, rage, resignation and determination. Arlene is trying to start a new life after being released from prison for committing a violent robbery. She has to adjust to her new situation while dealing with a prison guard, Bennie (Tommy Goodwin, a nice mix of clueless and overbearing), who quit his job just to drive her from Alabama to her new/old home in Kentucky; her negative, piece-of-work mother (Lara Askew); and her old pimp, Carl (Kelton Mills), who's trying to drag Arlene back to her old ways as "Arlie," whose early days and time in prison are shown in flashbacks.

As we get to know Arlene's back story — an abusive father, a critical and dismissive mother who doesn't believe in her, a series of men who victimize her — her winding up in prison becomes less surprising, her determination to escape her past and better herself more impressive.

On the play's opening night, actress Penelope Sangiorgi, a visiting student from Rose Bruford College in London who's playing Arlie, was no doubt afflicted by the horrible cold virus that's been going around and had completely lost her voice. (Two other cast members are Rose Bruford visitors as well: Askew, and Safi-Veliora Omar, who play's Arlene's sympathetic neighbor and has the great line, "It's funny as (expletive), the number of men who come without ears.") In a pretty brave move, however, Sangiorgi performed anyway, mouthing her lines as another actress read them from the shadows.

It took a little getting used, but in a way, since all of Arlie's scenes are flashbacks, it added an off-kilter, dreamlike feel to her scenes. In any case, it's a great example of doing what you gotta do so that the show can go on.

It all plays out on Randall A. Enlow's outstanding set, which makes a striking visual connection between Arlene's time in a prison cell and her new apartment, which is in some ways no less confining and difficult to escape.

"Getting Out" is an ambitious production for college students, and some moments don't quite come off. Playing these on-the-edge characters often proves to a be a bit of a stretch. It's a good stretch, though, and great experience for these talented student actors, who ultimately deliver a deeply considered and well-staged production.

Contact John Staton at 910-343-2343 or John.Staton@StarNewsOnline.com.

Want to go?

What: "Getting Out," by Marsha Norman, presented by the University of North Carolina Wilmington's Department of Theatre.

When: 8 p.m. Nov. 15-17 and 2 p.m. Nov. 18

Where: Mainstage Theatre in the Cultural Arts Building, UNCW campus

Info: Tickets are $15; $12 for seniors and UNCW alums, faculty and staff; $6 for students.

Details: 910-962-3500 or UNCW.edu/Theatre.