A BITTER TRUTH WRAPPED IN A SWEET TITLE

Fresh Ink’s absorbing production of Sugar, by playwright Tara Moses, is anything but saccharine. Under the sure direction of Audrey Seraphin, Sugar is deeply satisfying.

At the center is Brooke (a forceful Tiffany Santiago), a woman juggling three jobs and still unable to pay her bills or keep herself afloat economically. When her neighbor Nina (Tanya Avendaño Stockler) introduces her to a site offering an unconventional route to financial stability, Brooke’s journey takes a logical turn. Enter handsome and sincere Derek (Chingwe Padraig Sullivan), a man who is reckoning with his own form of exploitation and misrecognition.

Peyton Tavares’s unadorned set and Kailey Bennett’s efficient prop choices underscore the stark reality these characters inhabit. Innovative sound design by Anna Drummond add to the set by giving us access to Brooke’s audio environment.

Moses’s precise and witty script unpacks not only the commodification of women’s bodies but also the intersections of race, class, and performative allyship. The three white characters (Katherine Callaway, Rob Cope, Matthew Feldman-Campbell) function less as villains than as mirrors—reflecting the casual, often unconscious complicity of a society that claims to “see” without truly looking.

Yet Sugar is not without warmth. The complex friendship between Santiago and Stockler and the nuanced solidarity between Santiago and Sullivan challenge audience assumptions and provide more than empty entertainment calories to nurture deeper understanding.

This is a production that rewards attention and invites reflection. For a show produced with modest means, the return on investment—emotional, intellectual, and theatrical—is impressively high.

photos by Erin Solomon

Sugar
Fresh Ink
Boston Center for the Arts
ends on May 3, 2025
for tickets, visit Fresh Ink

Pay What You Want on 4/30 ($10 minimum)
BOGO Nights on Thursday 4/24 and 5/01 (Buy 1 Get 1 tickets when purchased online–
no code needed, must buy 2 tickets to receive the discount)

for more shows, visit Theatre in Boston