Pound for pound ‘Sugar Ray’ champions a gladiator
Reginald L. WIlson as Sugar Ray Robinson in “Sugar Ray”
by Laurence Holder, directed by Luther D. Wells, Presented
by 24 Bond Arts Center in association with Faith Steps
Productions at Gene Frankel Theatre, 24 Bond Street, NYC.
Jonathan Slaff
Caribbean Life, JANUARY 21-27, 2022 11
Inside a 74-seat theater space
in the East Village, patrons are
able to sit ringside watching
“Sugar Ray,” the life story of
Walker Smith Jr., the reputed
King of Harlem and acclaimed
boxing champion better known
as Sugar Ray Robinson.
There at the cozy, historic
spot, known as Gene Frankel
Theater, audiences are transformed
spectators to a oneman
presentation detailing
how the Ailey, Georgia-born
sports legend achieved royalty
in New York after moving here
from Detroit to emerge GOAT
(greatest of all time) during the
“golden years of boxing.”
Presented without intermission,
a 75-minute production
features set design by Patrice
Davidson, lighting by Lucky
Gilbert Pearto, sound by Thomas
R. Gordon and Kimberly
K. Harding and costume design
by Edith Carnley.
With a lot of help from playwright
Laurence Holder, director
Luther D. Well and an autobiography,
the main attraction
delivers sparring jabs, and ribtickling
nostalgia spotlighting
the antics of a gladiator denied
by pre-TV sports exposure.
“Robinson was boxing history’s
first winner of five divisional
championships (in the
middle weight and welterweight
divisions).”
He won the Golden Gloves
featherweight championship
in 1939 and its lightweight
championship in 1940. Turning
pro, he was World Welterweight
Champion from 1946
to 1951 and added the World
Middleweight crown the latter
year. He retired in 1952, only
to return to the ring two and a
half years later and continued
fighting way beyond his prime,
until 1965, in a lifetime struggle
to get out of IRS trouble (he
never succeeded). He regained
the middleweight crown in
1955 and held it on and off,
until 1959.”
The era is revisited with
reminders of familiar monikers
branding champions the Greatest,
the Raging Bull, Hurricane,
the Brown Bomber and other
distinguishing nicknames.
Also recalled for its colorful
characters, fanciful champions
and extravagant spenders,
victors during the period
were dubbed by their most conspicuous
characteristics. The
sweetest of all was given the
nickname Sugar after a woman
at one of Robinson’s fights in
Watertown, N.Y. described him
“sweet as sugar.”
His natty outfits, processed
hair, towering five feet 11 stature,
jocular personality and
flair for fashion sweetened his
claim to the name. He drove a
pink Cadillac.
That he had a penchant for
courting pretty women compounded
the merited tag.
Actor Reginald L. Wilson
channels the five-time champ.
Boasting similar statistics, at
five feet 10 inches, pound for
pound the actor manages to
entice audiences to experience
the spectacle of fights and also
share in Robinson’s quest to
win.
From the first bell Wilson
conquers the role.
The signals transition discoveries
from his autobiography
enabling round by round
explanation Wilson challenges
in bouts Robinson faced in and
out of the ring.
At times the actor steps
outside the rope to challenge
unsuspecting patrons who
might flinch at his revelations.
In one hour and 15 minutes
without intermission, Wilson
without referee, manager
and the barest of props, takes
his audience to meet lovers, an
absentee father, mother, sisters,
mobsters, pariahs and racists.
Catch You On The Inside!
Inside Life
By Vinette K. Pryce
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