Shown this fall at Steppenwolf Theatre, James Ijames’s The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington is a grotesque, dark, darkly humorous, and energetic exploration of America’s original sin: slavery. On a stage ringed by cotton fields, the Pulitzer Prize–winning Ijames depicts Miz Martha Washington’s feverish final moments in bed. When she dies, her hundreds.
When the COVID-19 lockdown hit in March 2020, Chicago’s artistic productions were abruptly placed on hold. Now more than two years later, theater companies are evaluating a path forward with an audience that has new expectations.
“I don’t come here to shame the founders (of our country), or in the case of my play, their spouses,” playwright James Ijames writes. “I come here to test the strength of their ideals.”
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