Power, Pride and the Breaking Point in 'American Buffalo' at Lumen Repertory Theatre

In the dim, cluttered recesses of a Chicago junk shop, three men circle a scheme like wolves around a carcass. There’s the shop’s owner, Donny Dubrow, trying to stay one step ahead of poverty and moral compromise. His young protégé, Bobby, skittish and uncertain, wants to prove his worth. And then there’s Teach, a walking powder keg with a leather jacket and a mean streak, who sees every slight as an excuse to seize power.

This is American Buffalo, David Mamet’s 1975 pressure cooker of a play. In Lumen Repertory Theatre’s taut, finely tuned production, directed by Tyler Hammond and Brian Niece, the pressure starts high and never lets up.

Brian Niece, pulling double duty as co-director and actor, makes Donny a man driven by impulse. His Donny doesn’t plan; he reacts. He talks at Bobby, not to him, doling out life advice in clichés and half-remembered wisdom that feel more like filler than mentorship. But beneath that bravado is a man who still wants to be good, or at least seem good. When Teach enters, though, Donny begins to shift. He mirrors Teach’s bluster, adopting his cadence and intensity, as if trying to hold his own in a contest he didn’t ask to enter. The first time we see Donny truly struggle is when all three men are together. Suddenly, he’s caught between personas, unsure whether to protect Bobby or placate Teach. It’s in these moments, wedged between loyalty and self-preservation, that Donny starts to crack.

Joshua Britton Andrews’s portrayal of Bobby is heartbreakingly sincere. Small, hesitant and vulnerable, his Bobby isn’t just lost — he’s barely holding on. Andrews doesn’t play Bobby as dumb, but as someone deeply eager to matter to someone, anyone. His repeated questions and darting eyes tell us more than dialogue ever could. This is a kid who knows he’s in over his head but still wants to belong. The fear in his performance is not just physical, but existential.

Enter David Alford as Teach: blunt, aggressive and immediately commanding. He storms into the shop like he owns it, even if his place in this trio feels more assumed than earned. Alford inhabits the role with meticulous naturalism. He picks bacon from his teeth mid-thought, shifts uncomfortably in a creaky desk chair, absently smooths his pant leg and sniffs with mild irritation, as if the shop’s dust is a personal affront. These small tics make Teach feel palpably real — agitated, restless and always on edge. Alford never forces a moment. His performance is raw and reactive.

Mamet’s dialogue is famously clipped and confrontational, and Hammond and Niece lean into that rhythm without making it feel mechanical. The characters interrupt, repeat and lose track of their sentences — not because the writing is chaotic, but because it’s real. Profanity courses through the script like pigment in a Pollock painting — seemingly splattered, but every stroke calculated, layered with intention and rhythm. It’s everywhere, but never meaningless. Don’t expect lengthy soliloquies here. The truth comes out in fragments, in tone and in what’s left unsaid.

Claire Cimino’s scenic design transforms WJCT Studio B into a pawn shop so immersive that the audience steps directly into its world. With seating for just about 50, the intimacy of the space becomes a vital storytelling tool. The fourth wall is quite literally the back wall of the shop, and the action pushes right to the audience’s feet. It’s a cluttered environment, but the chaos is measured. Unlike a truly overstuffed junk shop, which might be impassable, this space is deliberately scaled back to give the actors room to maneuver — both physically and emotionally. That restraint serves a deeper narrative truth: this isn’t a thriving business; it’s a front. Don’s shop isn’t filled with valuables because Don isn’t good at running a shop. It’s a staging ground for schemes, and Cimino’s design artfully walks the line between realism and theatrical necessity with precision.

Camala Pitts’s costume design layers character, class and tension into every look, precisely sketching each man’s emotional terrain. Donny’s retro-patterned polo and belted slacks suggest a man desperately trying to project competence even as he unravels. Bobby’s oversized army-green jacket and worn jeans feel like hand-me-downs, perfectly capturing his fragile sense of self and yearning to belong. And then there’s Teach, strutting in with a caramel leather jacket and garish paisley shirt — all bravado and false polish. But when he reappears dressed head to toe in stark black, from sharp boots to a gleaming belt buckle, the shift is unmistakable. This is a man who came back to dominate. Pitts’s choices aren’t just period appropriate — they’re dramatically alive, stitching character, status and story into every thread.

American Buffalo doesn’t reach for theatricality; it strips it away. In Lumen Repertory Theatre’s close-quarters staging, the audience becomes a fly on the wall, watching three men navigate a slow-motion collapse of trust and ambition. You don’t watch these men fall apart from a safe distance — you sit inches from their unraveling. There’s a quiet thrill in that proximity — not just seeing the action unfold, but feeling it vibrate at arm’s length. This production doesn’t overwhelm with spectacle; it builds tension through detail, silence and emotional precision. What emerges is a raw, tightly wound portrait of friendship, mentorship and masculinity coming apart in real time. It’s a rare thing to witness a production this sharp, this raw and this unrelenting. Miss it, and you’ll miss one of the most fiercely intimate pieces of theater this city will see all year.

American Buffalo runs Friday, June 13 through Saturday, June 28 at the WJCT Studio B.

For more information, full cast and crew credits and links to tickets, visit the American Buffalo page here on JaxPlays.