An affecting 'King Hedley II' straddles hope and despair

“I know which way the wind blow too. It don’t blow my way.”

King Hedley II, the title character in August Wilson’s eighth play in his American Century Cycle, is keenly aware the odds are stacked against him. Still, he holds tightly to his dream of owning a video store and raising a child with his wife Tonya.

Actors’ Shakespeare Project returns to Hibernian Hall for “King Hedley II” through March 31, following last year’s deeply moving production of Wilson’s “Seven Guitars.” The action is set 40 years later — we are now in 1985 — in that same cramped backyard in the Hill District of Pittsburgh, complete with a tiny garden patch, where so many seeds are planted and so many dreams are buried. Jon Savage’s “Seven Guitars” set also returns, with its simple backdoor entrances and evocative city backdrops, creating a familiar milieu for the action that unfolds.

Director Summer L. Williams deftly guides her Actors’ Shakespeare Project cast along those dangerous currents that push and pull King Hedley II between hope and despair. And she skillfully navigates their moves through Wilson’s many monologues and epistolary speeches, never letting the layers of historical context, subplots and collection of characters (seen and unseen) slow the drama’s relentless escalation of circumstances that lead to the shocking climax.

The action follows King Hedley II (James Ricardo Milord), who was conceived during the period when “Seven Guitars” took place, newly released from prison and trying to restart his life with Tonya (Karimah Williams), raising money to open a video store with his pal Mister (Omar Robinson, giving Mister the right, easy-going manner with just a hint of the desperation underneath) by selling refrigerators — of dubious provenance — to the residents of the Hill District. But the obstacles to success of any kind are legion, starting with simple, personal slights — like his inability to retrieve the birthday photos he brought in to be developed, even though he has the receipt — to the overall dismissal of the importance of Black lives, evidenced by the police’s lack of interest in finding the killer of a young boy from the neighborhood. Although Hedley and Mister are inching closer to the $10,000 they need to start their business, the pressure to tap that pool of money is difficult to resist. Mister’s wife took all the furniture when she left him, and he needs a bed to sleep on. Hedley needs to buy a crib and other equipment for the baby Tonya is expecting.

The lines between the past and the present continue to overlap with the appearance of next-door neighbor Stool Pigeon (an affecting Brandon G. Green), our narrator, sometime participant and evangelist, as well as Elmore, a long absent lover who is eager to reconnect with Ruby, King Hedley’s mom (Patrice Jean-Baptiste). Naheem Garcia is terrific as Elmore, the slick, sweet-talking gambler and con man, whose charm is irresistible. His two monologues — about how meaningless money is and how God cut him loose for taking a life — are worth the price of admission alone.

But the heart and soul of this production is Milord’s complicated, sympathetic, tortured King Hedley II, who is focused on the practicalities of providing for his family one minute and the next is convinced there’s a halo around his head. Milord captures King’s hard-earned wisdom about what he lost when he took a man’s life; his gentle pleading with Tonya to keep their baby; and with Mister to stay the course and remember the goal of running their own store. Milord captures all the competing forces that tear at King’s confidence, from the internal doubts about his own abilities and his lineage to the unrelenting external pressures that chip away at every bit of forward momentum. Milord reins in Wilson’s occasionally meandering monologues with his tightly wrought performance. Never for a moment do we doubt that this King will explode, even as we cling to the hope that the video store might become a reality. The frustration, desperation, confusion and rage that erupt in the climactic scene are stunning, even when we knew all along that things would not end well.

Director Williams has every member of her ensemble lean into the beauty and power of Wilson’s poetry while anchoring it solidly with characters who are recognizable and sympathetic. She never lets anyone get caught in a slower current, but we are also willing to follow them wherever they go because their portrayals are so convincing and compelling. Ultimately, Actors’ Shakespeare Project’s “King Hedley II” is a mesmerizing journey into the Black experience of 1985, with uncomfortable parallels to today.

“King Hedley II,” presented by Actors’ Shakespeare Project in partnership with Hibernian Hall through April 7.