In an interview, 25-year-old playwright Chinaka Hodge called her world premiere "a hilarious jaunt through racism and lynchings." Turns out, she wasn't kidding. Mirrors in Every Corner is a deeply funny (I had to clap my hand over my mouth a few times to stifle the hyena-like snorts), genre-twisting story of a family just like any other family - three squabbling siblings, a harried mother, and a baby sister with strawberry blonde curls and green eyes.
Only this family is African-American and the youngest member - "white as rice or flour or other things that also come in brown" - is a perplexing aberration. Set against the backdrop of the LA riots, episodes of Blossom, and the Quake of '89, Mirrors in Every Corner doesn't shy away from sticky issues and gracefully shifts between a family's past and present as they try to figure out what, exactly, to do with a black girl trapped in a white girl's body. A moving debut from a bright young playwright, Mirrors might be the best thing you do this month. Go.
Through March 21. Intersection for the Arts, 446 Valencia St. Tickets are $15-25 at www.theintersection.org.
