Review of Griffin Theatre's Golden Boy

Once upon a time I went to a show and it was called Golden Boy. It was by Clifford Odets and directed by Jonathan Berry. It was about a boxer named Joe (Nate Santana) who used to be a violin player and he had a big family and some of his family were like, "Yay! He's a boxer!" But then some of the family, for example his dad (Norm Woodel), did not like it at all. Joe’s manager Moody (Mark Pracht) had a girlfriend named Lorna (Nina O’Keefe) but Joe was in love with her. That’s a problem because she has just gotten engaged to Moody. I think that this was a really good play, and even though I’m not really a boxing person, I really liked it.

There were some scenes with Joe’s family to show you that he was not very nice to his family. But they were very supportive of Joe. I thought they were very funny because of how Siggie (Morgan Maher) and Anna (Laura Lapidus) were quarreling and then they were completely in love with each other. There was a friend of his dad’s named Carp (Jerry Bloom) who owned a candy shop and he liked to talk about candy and philosophy. I thought that he was really funny, how his goodbye present to Joe was a lollipop. It doesn’t end happy and funny though because of what Joe says to his dad about his birthday present. It made you angry at Joe because his father did a lot to get him that present and then he just didn’t want it.

Joe had kind of two families. His real family and his boxing family that helped him through getting to be a boxer. The members of that family are Roxy (John Connolly), Tokio (Jason Lindner), Moody, Eddie (David Prete) and Lorna. I think that Tokio was the nicest of his boxing family. I thought Tokio seemed like he was very complimentary and nice to everyone. He seemed like someone people might actually want to be friends with. I thought how he was always encouraging Joe was awesome. Not all people encourage. Roxy never encouraged him because he was always bickering about how Joe should have done some other kind of punch. Moody encouraged him more than Roxy but still not enough. His manager Eddie seemed like he almost gave him enough encouragement, but the thing was he just wanted women to be attracted to Joe; he didn't want Joe to be a better boxer. He just wanted to see someone else end up like him, and he wanted all the attention so he wanted people to look at him and say he helped Joe so he must be rich and handsome too. Joe's sort-of girlfriend Lorna sort-of helps him. But sometimes she doesn't when she leaves him hanging on a question or something.

I think one of the most hilarious scenes was the one with Mickey (David Cady Jr.) and Pepper (Connor McNamara) in it. Pepper was fighting the same night as Joe, and Mickey is his trainer. It was really funny because Pepper seemed really really stupid. He thought that 1200 was less that 1000. I thought that Mickey seemed like the smarter one, because he is the one who told him that he got $1200, then Pepper said I only work for $1000 or more. Then Mickey was like, ok, you get $1000. So Mickey got $200. I think he did deserve it because he did a lot of work. Right after this funny scene there was a very sad scene, where a boxer called the Chocolate Drop was killed by Joe. He punched him too hard. And then his manager (Johnny Moran) came in and started yelling, “You killed my boy!” I felt very sad. I think that these two scenes being together made the Chocolate Drop’s death more sad.

There is a love triangle in this between Lorna, Moody, and Joe. It is not the most tricky love triangle but Lorna keeps going back and forth between I love him, no I love him. It is obvious that she should be with Joe, but she just doesn't see that. She should be with Joe because he gives her more happiness. She's unhappy because she feels unhappy for Moody, but Moody should have just stayed with his wife. He was purposely trying to make his wife not love him anymore so he could go and marry Lorna. I don't think that's good because if his wife was happy with him but he just found another woman, then if he was not unhappy with her, he should have just stayed. But Lorna does finally make a decision, but it doesn't turn out as well as she hoped it would.

People who would like this show are people who like love triangles, boxing, and candy-shop owning philosophers. People should definitely go see this show. It will make you find ways to think of boxing that you never thought to think about before. It also tells you a little bit about love.

Photos: Michael Brosilow