The themes explored in Alice Childress’s “Wine in the Wilderness” currently running at Classic Stage Company include classism and economic struggles; the resilience and strength of communities and individuals navigating challenges in the economic, social and personal environments; identity; and the role of the arts in interpreting and influencing societal norms. And although these themes resonate in every community, Childress is concerned exclusively how they resonate in the Black community and is particularly concerned about the complexities of and the resilience of Black womanhood. Many of these themes were at issue in the Harlem Riots.

The 1964 Harlem Riots occurred after the 15-year-old black teenage James Powell was murdered in July of that year by NYPD Officer Thomas Gilligan. Young Powell was shot and killed in front of his friends and witnesses. Alice Childress does not deal directly with these important riots; however, they serve as the dramatic backdrop for the turmoil occurring inside the apartment of the thirty-three-year-old artist Bill Jameson (an out-of-touch and overconfident Grantham Coleman) where he is finishing the third triptych of “Wine in the Wilderness” his homage to Black women in global history.

When Oldtimer (a gritty and streetwise Milton Craig Nealy) arrives at Bill’s apartment (set design by Arnulfo Maldanado) with items he looted during the riot, he asks the artist about the triptych. Bill boasts, “This is the unfinished third of “Wine in the Wilderness.” She’s gonna be the kinda chick that is grass roots … no, not grass roots … I mean she’s underneath the grass roots. The lost woman … what the society has made out of our women.” All he needs is a model for the unfinished panel.

That model is Tomorrow “Tommy” Marie (an imposing and sensitive Olivia Washington) who is found in a bar by Bill’s friends Sonny-man (Brooks Brantly) and Cynthia (Lakisha May). Until Bill receives the call from them, he imagined they “might be downstairs dead,” victims of the night’s riot. “Tommy’s” entrance into Bill’s apartment with Sonny-man and Cynthia is climactic and initiates the narrative’s falling action and resolution.

After Tomorrow and Bill’s initial attraction that results in a stayover, the model discovers exactly why she has been chosen. Oldtimer is explaining the triptych to “Tommy” using the same words Bill used in his conversation with the Oldtimer.  He explains the first painting is “The Queen of the Universe … the finest chick in the world” and that model is not “Tommy.” Rather “Tommy” is “gonna be this here last one. The worst gal in town. A messed-up chick that-that.”

After Tomorrow confronts Bill, Sonny-boy, and Cynthia, they attempt to disregard her appropriate rage. She responds with this dramatic language: “If a black somebody is in a history book, or painted on a pitcher, or drawed on a paintin’ … or if they’re a statue … dead, and outta the way, and can’t talk back, then you dig ’em and full-a so much-a damn admiration and talk ’bout “our” history. But when you run into us livin’ and breathin’ ones, with the life’s blood still pumpin’ through us … then you comin’ on ’bout we ain’ never together. You hate us, that’s what! You hate black me!”

This is a powerful and important statement for the Black community and for the Black community. Seeing Alice Childress’s work back on the New York stage is a gift. One wishes that she were still writing and challenging audiences to come to the same conclusion Tomorrow arrives at. Her final words to Bill are “But I’m goin back to the nitty-gritty crowd, where the talk is we-ness and us-ness. I hate to do it but I have to thank you ’cause I’m walkin’ out with much more than I brought in.” We should all walk out of the theater with much more than we brought in.

“Wine in the Wilderness” is a narrative about classism within the Black community. Bill and the other characters in Childress’s play wrongly judge Tomorrow “Tommy” Marie as an everyday working woman, the throwaway “unideal” Black woman in an artist’s triptych. But Olivia Washington’s “Tommy” is multilayered: she is dignified; she is intelligent; she is a strong woman. It was courageous for Alice Childress to call out classism within the Black community. Her intelligent craft dignifies her status as one of America’s outstanding playwrights.