A narrative film inspired by the real-life Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) theatre program inside the titular maximum security prison, Sing Sing begins with Colman Domingo, as an incarcerated playwright and performer named Divine G, delivering the exit monologue of Midsummer Night’s Dream. But it was a line from a different Shakespeare play I kept circling back to: “Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this sun of York.” A performer of exceptional charisma and an Oscar nominee for Ruskin surely destined for another nomination for his work here, Domingo radiates warmth as Divine G. Almost improbably given his circumstances, he is glorious summer, and the sun the other men in the RTA program quietly revolve around. Only a newcomer to the group, the hardened Divine Eye (Maclin), resists Divine G’s gravitational pull.
Maclin is an RTA alum, and in fact he’s playing a version of his own story here. (Indeed, much of the cast graduated from RTA; they’re naturals – all lived-in faces and came-to-play verbal sparring – but are somewhat formless as distinct characters.) Austin writer/director Greg Kwedar and his co-writer/co-producer Clint Bentley rooted the film in the experiences of Maclin, John “Divine G” Whitfield, and RTA director Brent Buell (played by Sound of Metal Oscar nominee Paul Raci), who writes the parody musical the RTA men tackle next. A mish-mash of Hamlet, Peter Pan, time travel, and Ancient Egypt called Breakin’ the Mummy’s Code, the production is teased in bits but never really comes into picture for the viewer as a whole. No matter – the rehearsal process is the point. It’s in this space that masculinity is interrogated, imagination is nourished, and these men get to be defined not by their past trauma but by their resilience and renewed capacity for joy. This is the space in which the empathic Sing Sing soars.
Read Richard Whittaker’s interview with Colman Domingo, Greg Kwedar, and Clint Bentley.
This article appears in August 9 • 2024.
