A big shadow looms over Stephen Karam’s lovely, surprisingly funny new play, “Sons of the Prophet.” It’s that of Kahlil Gibran and his best-selling collection of vague, inspirational prose poems, “The Prophet.”
The show’s Douaihy family — Maronite Christians who immigrated to the US from Lebanon — is distantly related to Gibran. But whereas the proto-hippie philosopher’s optimistic message was “You are far, far greater than you know, and all is well,” the Douaihys can’t catch a break.
In fact, their working-class life in gritty Nazareth, Pa., takes a turn for deep suckiness when the play opens. After their father dies in a car accident caused by a high-schooler’s prank, brothers Joseph (the marvelous Santino Fontana, last seen in “The Importance of Being Earnest”) and Charles (promising newcomer Chris Perfetti) are left to fend for themselves. They must also take in their elderly uncle, Bill (Yusef Bulos), who’s in shaky health.
Bill’s not the only one. While 18-year-old Charles seems to be holding up under the pressure, Joseph, a decade older, is wracked by severe knee pains, which are spreading in mysterious ways.
Joseph has taken a job with book-packager Gloria (Joanna Gleason, in fine form) solely for the health insurance. Stressed to his eyeballs, he endures her constant meddling and urging to pitch a family memoir pegged to their famous relative — which Gloria sees as her ticket back to the publishing big leagues.
Desperate as the circumstances are “Sons of the Prophet” steers clear of pathos. Though the play deals with suffering, grief and the fear of aging and illness, it deftly mixes emotion and laughter, and even veers into farce.
Its 31-year-old playwright is one to watch. Karam’s “Speech & Debate,” was well received two years ago, and he wrote the libretto for the opera “Dark Sisters,” which opens next month.
Here, he does get carried away with too many subplots, and the scenes involving the football star who caused the accident are awkwardly grafted on.
But this Roundabout production, excellently directed by Peter DuBois, overcomes these minor faults, mostly because Karam gives us people we can care about. He has a knack for grounding them with telling details, like Gloria taking pretend phone calls to avoid uncomfortable conversations.
The playwright’s empathy for his characters is contagious. We cringe in dread as Joseph undergoes new medical tests, then has to figure out how to pay for them. We want to yell warnings before he embarks on an affair with a possibly manipulative reporter (Charles Socarides).
By the end, we wish for a sequel so we can spend more time with these flawed, brave people.