Manhattan Theatre Club ushers us into a world of not-too-long ago (or so it seems) where secretive agencies battle in the shadows using innocents as pawns in Rajiv Joseph’s new play Dakar 2000. Directed by May Adrales, Dakar 2000 is a tale of manipulation – of people, of facts, of motivations — all for some barely-defined “greater good”. Or is it for revenge?
We are introduced to this world in a small Senegalese village. A Peace Corps volunteer of Muslim descent, Boubs (Abubakr Ali), seems to have found a purpose to his aimless life, bringing water to the village and encouraging a communal vegetable garden. But his work visa has expired, bringing him to the attention of a government functionary, Dina (Mia Barron). She parades a variety of misfortunes before him, allowing his ignorance and naivety to imagine all sorts of potential punishments, before offering him an out. He jumps at the chance to be left alone in the village which has become his true home. Dina gets Boubs to perform more seemingly innocent tasks, playing on his altruistic spirit and his emotions as he falls under the seductive excitement of playing a secret agent.
Dina finally tells Boubs a story about close friends who worked with her at an embassy in another country. A bombing kills her embassy friends; Dina was spared because she stayed home sick that day. Playing on Boubs’ sympathies, she tells of the mastermind behind the bombing and other atrocities, and her desire to avenge her dead friends. The mastermind has been tracked to Senegal’s capital city, Dakar; it’s the eve of the year 2000, and Dina wants Boubs to get the man’s picture and fingerprints for final proof of his identity.
Joseph’s script, written from the point of view of an older Boubs, pulls the audience into the maze-like story. Boubs is an unreliable narrator, revealing in early scenes how easily he’s willing to hide facts to protect himself from Dina’s questioning. Dina reveals herself to Boubs first as some low-level bureaucratic flunky, later telling him she really works for a government agency more secret than the CIA. Their revelations to each other as the play proceeds seem more and more self-serving, until you’re left wondering who — if anyone — is telling the truth, about what, and when.
Ali creates a likeable goof, extremely naive and optimistic, easily manipulated and prey to his emotions. Barron’s government agent is cool but not cold, a Lady Macbeth personality in modern dress, for whom any means to reach her end is permissible. Watching these two characters collide and collude is a treat to see.
Tim Mackabee’s scenic design makes use of a large turntable, taking us from office to cafe to the rooftop of Boubs’ village home (a long curved platform along one side of the turntable). As lit by Alan C. Edwards with sound design by Bray Poor, they create the world of the small African country that is the background for Boubs and Dina’s adventures.
Dakar 2000 is an easy play to get sucked into, and once you succumb, it grips tightly until the sour-ish ending. Joseph, a Pulitzer Prize finalist for his Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, has written an unsettling, nearly-hopeless psychological thriller. It is the type of complex modern drama the Manhattan Theatre Club excels at, and I encourage you to take a chance and travel back in time to Dakar 2000!
Dakar 2000 is presented by the Manhattan Theatre Club at Stage I of the New York City Center, 131 West 55th Street in New York, through Mar. 23, 2025. For more information or to purchase tickets, go to manhattantheatreclub.com.
