James Ijames’ ‘Fat Ham’ @ Stage West Theatre

Photos by Evan Michael Woods

—Rickey Wax

Stage West Theatre, in partnership with Dallas Theater Center, closes out D-FW’s “Black Broadway Summer” series with the regional premiere of Fat Ham, a backyard tragedy (and comedy!) served sizzling hot. Who needs Elsinore Castle when you’ve got a North Carolina backyard with mismatched folding chairs, a half-kinked water hose, deflated balloons, and string lights hung like someone gave up halfway through? James Ijames’s Fat Ham, winner of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2023 Tony Award for Best Play, proves that Shakespeare’s story of grief and revenge is just as compelling—maybe even more so—when it’s happening over barbecue smoke, a loaf of Wonder bread, and a bowl of potato salad.

Ijames sets the play in a backyard inspired by his hometown of Bessemer, North Carolina. Scenic designer Donna Marquet nails the look so vividly you expect to step on an empty beer bottle on your way in. At the center of this mise-en-scène is Juicy (Tyler Ray Lewis), described by Ijames as a “thick, Black, queer boy.” He mourns his father while working toward a degree in human resources at the University of Phoenix—a humorous detail, but one that underscores his desire to impose order in a world defined by chaos. Juicy’s uncle Rev (Calvin Gabriel) has just married his mother Tedra (Nikka Morton)—only a week after her husband was stabbed to death in prison.

So it begins like the “Jerry Springer” show, and turns into “Ghost Hunters” when the ghost of Juicy’s father (also played by Gabriel) appears, revealing that his brother Rev is guilty of the murder. Carving knives and pork in Fat Ham are both literal and symbolic—food, inheritance, and violence all bound together. The cookout quickly becomes a battleground of conscience, even if the weapons are karaoke microphones and rounds of charades instead of swords.

The characters echo Shakespeare’s archetypes while living fully in Southern culture. Rev struts in devil-red with fisherman sandals, the official footwear of grill masters, declaring, “You gon’ respect me in this house.” Tedra (Nikka Morton) brings vitality and humor, and her karaoke dance for Rev is a highlight—sexy, comic, and a little tragic, her body performing away the family’s guilt. Family friend Rabby (Cherish Love), dazzling in pink with a Louis Vuitton purse, is hilarious on the surface, but her sequins serve as armor, hinting at a secret she’d rather not reveal.

Her daughter Opal, played by Jori Jackson, is all defiance, pairing her hated party dress with Chuck Taylors. Jackson brings a sharp, rebellious energy, making Opal more resilient than fragile. Her Marine brother Larry, played by Caleb Mosley, wears his military discipline like a mask. His restrained posture reveals the pressure of repression, and Mosley shines when cracks of “softness” appear. And Juicy’s best friend Tio (as in Hora-tio), played by Zachary J. Willis, drifts through scenes with stoner looseness. Willis’s charm makes him the play’s unlikely truth-teller, grounding the comedy in wisdom.

Design sharpens the storytelling. Whitney Coulter’s costumes are character studies in themselves: Juicy’s black mourning clothes, Opal’s rebellious sneakers, Rabby’s sequined façade, Tedra’s playful yet defensive romper. Luke Atkison’s lighting floods the stage in purple at key moments. Purple has always meant royalty in Shakespeare, but here it crowns Juicy as heir to this backyard kingdom and its generational legacies.

Tyler Ray Lewis gives a showstopping performance as Juicy, most memorably in their wry, grounded take on Radiohead’s “Creep.” Juicy’s soliloquies anchor the play. They echo Shakespeare’s form while voicing modern anxieties about queerness, masculinity, and cycles of violence. “I don’t like killing nothing. Not even bugs,” he admits, a confession that sets him apart from both his late father and Rev, who embody toxic, “hard” masculinity. These moments of direct address strip away the noise and ask whether survival might mean rejecting brutality altogether.

Karaoke, by contrast, is spectacle. Characters belt out songs and dance routines, masking rather than exposing their truths. Tedra’s gyrating routine for Rev is hilarious but tinged with denial, her body working overtime to hold the façade. Soliloquy uncovers; karaoke covers. The contrast is one of Ijames’s sharpest dramaturgical moves.

Where Shakespeare’s Hamlet ends with a stage full of corpses, Fat Ham insists on another path that you will have to go see for yourself. I can say it’s a radical departure, declaring that queer Black boys deserve joy, not tragedy.

Under the direction of vickie washington, this production balances humor and sorrow. The play insists that joy is resistance, and that crowns can be claimed not just in castles, but in backyards where the balloons sag and the lights hang crooked.

Ijames has transformed Shakespeare’s tragedy into a play about survival, identity, and liberation. Juicy is no longer a doomed prince. He is a Black, thick, queer son who claims his crown.

WHEN: August 28-September 14, 2025
WHERE: 821 W. Vickery Blvd, Fort Worth
WEB: stagewest.org
Scenic Design by Donna Marquet, Lighting Design/Drag Consulting and Co-Design by Luke Atkison, Costume Design/Drag Co-Design by Whitney Coulter, Sound Design by Cresent Haynes, Wigs, Hari, and Makeup by Nick Lynch-Voris, Props Coordination by John Slauson and Nicole Gaignat, Choreography by La’Hunter Smith, Fight Choreography by Jeffrey Colangelo, Dramaturgy by Harold Steward and Djoré Nance, Technical Direction by Bryan Stevenson and Allen Dean, and Stage Management by Tiffany Cromwell.