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Review: “The Mountaintop” at Oakland Theatre Project

Review: “The Mountaintop” at Oakland Theatre Project

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 KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Mountaintop” at Oakland Theatre Project through Feb. 15, 2026. TEXT OF REVIEW: In late 2008, it felt as if we’d entered a new world. The Republicans were out of office, people of color were being appointed to key positions in business and government, and a black man had just been elected president. Martin Luther King’s dream seemingly had come true. Stories of his infidelities had come to light two decades earlier, and he’d been shown to have, as they say, feet of clay. He was no longer a god, but he was a hero. And Obama’s election had proven it. And in June 2009, The Mountaintop, a play by Katori Hall, about the last evening in the life of Martin Luther King, premiered in a small theatre in London, later moving to the West End, and coming to Broadway two years later. Now, under a very different national circumstance, The Mountaintop can be seen in an Oakland Theatre Project production, which runs through February 15th, this coming weekend. We are in Dr. King’s room at the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, just after his sermon, I’ve Been to the Mountaintop. Rain pounds the windows, lightning flashes, lights go on and off. He’s sent his assistant out looking for cigarettes and he’s waiting impatiently. He calls room service for coffee. A maid quickly appears. They chat, flirt, and then things take a surprising turn. In this staging, King’s motel room is also his tomb. We are not quite in the real world. But Dr. King, as performed brilliantly by William Thomas Hodgson, feels definitely real, as does Sam Jackson as Camae, the maid. Also real is the intimacy of the theatre, especially during the play’s various moments of crisis, when the audience feels like part of the production. The times are very different now than back in 2009. As the co-director of the production Michael Socrates Moran writes in the program, today It may very well be that the fate of our democracy hinges on the capacity of citizens to engage in non-violent resistance against armed federal paramilitary troops. He goes on to say that, Dr. King’s worldview stands as a bastion for radical humanization not only in the face of fascism, but also in the face of a status quo that privileges peace over justice, equality and freedom. In 2026, Dr. King’s mountaintop feels even further away than it did nearly sixty years ago, and what felt triumphant then takes on an irony nobody could have expected. But the play’s focus on King’s humanity and the humanity of his message still remains, as does the power of theater in this formidable production The Mountaintop plays at Oakland Theatre Project through February 15th. For more information, you can go to oaklandtheatreproject.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Mountaintop” at Oakland Theatre Project appeared first on KPFA.
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