Steppenwolf Theatre’s production of Suzan-Lori Parks’s The Book of Grace fails to unite a collection of dissonant, insufficiently intriguing vignettes. The play follows Grace (Zainab Jah) as she struggles to keep peace between her husband, Vet (Brian Marable), and Vet’s son from his first marriage, Buddy (Namir Smallwood), who insists on going by Snake. Snake is in his twenties and has just returned home from war—at least he claims he has—while Vet spends his days occasionally working for border patrol and mostly talking about working for border patrol. Grace, for her part, doesn’t do much at all. Theoretically, she works in a diner, and theoretically, she’s writing a book. But she, like her husband, spends most of her time talking and daydreaming.
The Book of Grace follows a familiar plot—much of American theater for the last century has contended with how homecomings shape family dynamics—and adds little. Its characters, though interesting, don’t quite feel real; action drives them rather than the other way around. And its central conceit, that Grace is telling her life story in little semi-fabricated anecdotes, falls through in a second act that strays too far into melodrama. In all, The Book of Grace’s greatest flaw is that it is not so much a play as it is two plays, such is the dissonance between its first and second movements.
The first act, which introduces us to the three characters and begins unraveling their backstories, plays out like a quiet murmur. It kind of bumps along in the early desert morning to the tune of the fan that whirs overhead. It is also, for good and for bad, agonizingly slow. We watch Grace unwrap a cake, Snake wander around the house, and Vet iron his suit over and over again. When The Book of Grace intentionally drags out its pacing—when it makes a point of the tenor of these three desperately boring lives—the slowness works. When, too frequently, the slowness is created by an unnecessary dragging out of dialogue or by the crosses that Grace’s frequent soliloquies require, the play stumbles.
And then, in the second act, everything comes falling down. The Book of Grace becomes something between a mystery, a political drama, and a thriller. Snake is suddenly a terrorist, and Vet—the play’s most intriguing character—is rendered a stereotype of toxic masculinity and abusive fatherhood. Grace remains oblivious to the devolution occurring around her; whether her relentless optimism is naivete or strength is an intriguing question with which The Book of Grace does not contend. Jah carries herself with real poise and finesse, and her soft, slightly lilting voice carries the play effectively through Parks’s most flowery language.
But this production cannot quite make up its mind about its central focus. It fails to decide if Grace is its heroine or its victim, or whether the play is actually not about Grace at all but about Snake’s descent into madness. Indeed, The Book of Grace is rarely poorly executed but frequently falls victim to an insufficiently clear and concise vision. This is a play that does not answer the fundamental questions that it must: Why is it being shown in Chicago, in 2025, and in the round?
Yet, there are touches of real beauty in The Book of Grace. Arnel Sancianco’s scenic design pairs plentiful naturalistic furniture with three massive hanging pallets. Raquel Adorno’s costuming effectively juxtaposes Vet, who strives constantly for his uniform to be perfectly pressed, with Snake, in a T-shirt and jeans, and Grace, who floats across the stage dressed in a green-and-white-checkered dress or an emerald silk robe.
But, even then, Adorno’s bright costumes clash with the pastels and browns of Sanciano’s set, and neither seems to fit the mood of lighting designer Jason Lynch’s alternating purple, yellow, and blue washes. The Book of Grace does not quite add up to a play so much as it adds up to a collection of attractive images held together by suggestions of a theme. In that way, at least, it mirrors its titular character’s manuscript.
Suzan-Lori Parks’s The Book of Grace is at Steppenwolf Theatre through May 18.
