INTERVIEW: Obi Abili’s debuts in topical ‘Emperor Jones’ at Irish Rep

Eugene O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones details the story of Brutus Jones, a tyrant who grabs power with the aid of intimidation, fear mongering and deception. He escapes from an American prison and sets up his dominion on a Caribbean island; however, his subjects, those in the native community, resist Brutus’ rule and drive him mad with haunting visions and troubling questions of his ascendancy.

In short, this play is a difficult one, dealing with issues of race, power and politics. The Irish Repertory Theatre, who have successfully staged the drama in the past, has revived the classic text with British newcomer Obi Abili in the title role. Audiences and critics have applauded and celebrated his efforts as Brutus, and the role is actually the actor’s first time starring in an American theatrical production.

“I’m blessed beyond belief,” Abili said recently in a phone interview. “I’m also terrified because it’s my very first job in the United States in New York, so I’ve been so, so blessed. But it’s probably the most difficult role in the African-American canon to do, and, you know, I had no idea when I said yes. But now I definitely do, and I’m very blessed. I’ve learned a hell of a lot.”

The production, which plays through May 21, is directed by Irish Rep’s co-founder Ciarán O’Reilly and features a cast comprised of William Bellamy, Carl Hendrick Louis, Sinclair Mitchell, Angel Moore, Andy Murray and Reggie Talley.

“I’m so pleased to be working with Ciarán O’Reilly, our director, and an amazing cast,” Abili said. “The Irish Rep are a wonderful, welcoming family. I couldn’t have asked for a better or bigger support network apparatus with such a complex, very tense role. I’m very lucky. I’m very lucky. I thought I’d be on like a small little walk-on part on CSI: Miami or something … Fate has dictated that it wasn’t going to be that, so I’m lucky that I’ve learned a lot with some great people around me.”

Although Abili is premiering in his first American theatrical production, he’s not a 100-percent newcomer to American stages. A couple of years ago, he worked with legendary director Ivo van Hove on a production of Antigone starring Oscar winner Juliette Binoche. That show toured the world and included a two-week engagement at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. It was those BAM performances where Abili met the right people and gained management representation in the United States.

“I spent a year processing my visa and finishing the tour and meeting casting directors,” he said. “Everything was pending, and I went back to England to do the visa process, went to the American embassy in May last year. And everything was finally processed, did a TV series with Dawn French called Delicious while I was waiting, and then I came back in October officially visa’d up. And I started the process.”

In early 2017, the offers for plays began to roll in, and he then met with O’Reilly about the prospects of leading the company of The Emperor Jones. It seems that Abili has been on a roller coaster of professional and personal triumphs ever since. “I met with Ciarán the following week, and he just said, ‘Let’s do it,'” he remembered. “And I was just, ‘OK.’ Kind of very English, ‘OK, let’s go.’ And it’s been seven weeks and an incredible journey.”

Abili’s other credits include the Globe Theatre’s production of Titus Adronicus and the Old Vic production of Six Degrees of Separation. He trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and can be seen in the upcoming film London Fields opposite Amber Heard, Billy Bob Thornton and Theo James. His UK miniseries credits are numerous: The Take, Injustice, Moses Jones and The Nativity.

“There is a kind of strange cosmic fate to all of this,” he said about his landing at Irish Rep. “I think, in life, that happens a lot, doesn’t it. Things just work, and you can’t really direct it. It’s just there to be. That’s how I ended up in Ciarán’s office, and he offered me the role.”

Abili, who credits American films and actors as a great influence on his life, called O’Neill’s drama an “incredible framework of psychology.”

“I’m a big fan of American culture and film,” he said. “I think my natural bent was to go toward that kind of, want of a better word, psychology and naturalism because that’s what I watched when I was a young boy when I watched all these amazing actors — De Niro, Pacino, Brando, Washington. They showed me the whole face of the human condition, and so the honor of having to deal with Eugene O’Neill’s text and trying to apply that at times is just overwhelming. It’s been amazing to be able to try and apply that to such an incredible writer. I never thought I’d be in a Eugene O’Neill play because his play is very controversial and about race, politics and all this kind of stuff.”

Of course, any revival of The Emperor Jones will touch upon issues that continue to resonate and challenge modern-day audiences. The United States, and much of the world, still struggles with racism, power and political malfeasance. Abili marvels at how timeless some of O’Neill’s words are in 2017. The playwright wrote the drama in the early 1920s, almost a century ago, and he has “an ability to understand human beings on a very seamless level throughout history, throughout time.”

“I marvel at the classical writers because the reason why they’re classical writers is because they’re timeless,” he said. “I swear they have some kind of time machine or something. They’re shaman. They can see through time, back and forward and beyond. … You can perform these plays in any language, and people will respond in the same way because it’s human. And so you’re dealing with that kind of depth of humanity with all these issues.”

Audiences at the Irish Rep, Abili said, have been shocked by his character because Brutus is a self-hating man who was traumatized with psychological abuse. This characterization is seen through the lens of race and politics, and the actor said he also picks up on psychological and spiritual elements.

“[O’Neill] was in Honduras prospecting a year or so before he did the play, and I’m sure he spent time with shaman out in the Caribbean and maybe drunk some of that jungle juice because there’s so many visions in the play,” he said. “I firmly believe [this] could only have been written by someone who had had some form of that experience. Eugene was a real outsider, as we know, and he was very much on the outskirts of society commenting in on it. … Certainly through his travels, I know he had a lot of extreme experiences.”

Abili added: “Then you add in the inevitable political scope of it — levels of power, certain figures making promises to the populace of a region and maybe not coming through with his promises. I don’t want to make any obvious comparisons to a certain person who is doing his thing right now, but it’s very easy to see the link, to see the similarities. All this I think resonates with audiences, and obviously race in this country is a big thing. So that’s always going to resonate and divide and cajole and cloak and rouse. … I think intellectualization in theater is all well and good. You can’t perform ideas. I think you can perform and tell stories that are based on emotion because that’s what people come to see. They come to experience something. Yeah, we’re doing that.”

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com

The Emperor Jones, starring Obi Abili and directed by Ciarán O’Reilly, is playing the Irish Repertory Theatre through May 21. Click here for more information and tickets.