By 
Deborah Hazlett and David Bishins in Woolly Mammoth’s Appropriate. Photo credit: Stan Barouh
“I try to go back home to visit family when I can.”
These were the words spoken to me by my cousin, who was in Washington, DC attending a medical conference. We were enjoying the delectable cuisine of José Andrés at Jaleo, right down the block from where I would soon be reviewing Woolly Mammoth‘s latest production: Appropriate.
“Otherwise the only time you see them is either when someone gets married or when someone dies. ”
It only seems fitting that we had this conversation before I attended Appropriate‘s opening night. Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s dramedy brings a family together in a situation similar to what my cousin and I discussed: taking care of the estate of their recently deceased father. Three siblings meet at the Southern plantation home of their late father to sell it off to the highest bidder in hopes of covering the debts and expenses he left behind. However instead of feeling a sense of unity through the ability to grieve with family, the three grow even further apart as their dysfunctional relationships have to support the weight of a startling discovery about their father. The ensuing drama will push and pull the audience in every direction.