The Arden presents Katori Hall’s The Mountaintop

Unmistakably human

Set on the night of April 3, 1968, in Room 306 of the Lorraine Motel, The Mountaintop unfolds just after King’s “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech, his final public address. From the outset, the King of the mountaintop, brilliantly played by Philadelphia favorite Akeem Davis, is unmistakably human. Davis avoids the trap of biographical imitation and instead invents a King who feels alive within the world of this play. He walks into the motel room, calls out to a friend to buy him some Pall Malls, coughs, and disappears offstage to urinate. This is a man who coughs, drinks, smokes, flirts, and worries. Hall brings the audience into King’s most vulnerable moments, stripping away the marble of the monument to reveal the man beneath.

Soon, King is joined by Camae (Kishia Nixon), a motel maid whose presence jolts the evening in unexpected directions. Nixon imbues Camae with humor, charisma, and bite, a perfect sparring partner for King. She curses, drinks, and smokes, encouraging him to do the same while holding up a mirror to his contradictions. Director Brett Ashley Robinson keeps the dynamic sexually tense but agile, using movement throughout the motel room to heighten their shifting intimacy and power. As the story unfolds, Camae drives the play into new and magical territory, and both Nixon and Davis handle the tonal shifts with precision and deep emotional commitment. At times, though, the momentum falters, as if the play lingers a beat too long between its bursts of humor and revelation.

A King’s last night

As the play changes in tone, we see Davis’s King wrestle with his own mortality. His struggle with death feels universal: he denies, bargains, yells, cries, and eventually accepts. Yet his desire to continue his movement remains historically and personally specific. Here we see King at his most vulnerable and, in some ways, his most familiar. Davis dips into the recognizable cadences of King’s oratory. Hall situates King at a political turning point, following the victories of the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. He is turning his focus to anti-war efforts and to a mass movement called the Poor People’s Campaign. Camae encourages a more radical response: “F*** the white man.” Delivered playfully but with the weight of history, this moment gives the production its dynamism.

Magical and real

Robinson’s production feels both magical and real. Reiko Huffman’s set delivers the verisimilitude of the historic motel while leaving room for Jorge Cousineau’s projections later in the show. These projections, which accompany a final monologue by Nixon about the future of King’s movement after his death, are mostly very effective. The script, written during the early Obama years, ends with the election of a Black president. Robinson extends the visuals into the present day. This decision feels earned when referencing Trayvon Martin and George Floyd, though the final images of the recent No Kings march in Philadelphia feel somewhat on the nose.

Ultimately, this production of The Mountaintop offers a striking opportunity to see humanity within greatness and to imagine what it might mean to reckon with the limits of one’s own influence. We leave the theater knowing there is more work to be done and with the open question of who will pick up the baton.