I'd even settle for a lightweight! puffs exasperated manager Tom Moody, and in this classic American tale of an innocent violin-player chewed up in the brutal and corrupt world of pro boxing circa 1930s, that's what he gets. Jeremy Glickstein is a pale, skinny, almost boneless ferret of an actor, more often seen playing pasty-faced psychopaths, and the moment we see him, we know that Joe Bonaparte, the kid hungry for escape from poverty and squalor, hasn't a chance. Neither does Lorna Moon, his no-better-than-she-can-afford to-be girl friend, played by Liz Fletcher with the bravado born of despair. Nor does his manager, a fundamentally good man forced to do business with boyhood chums now turned gangster.
This is no quasi-Rocky tale of underdog triumph -- this is the Great Depression, baby, and the only escape for a poor boy from the 'hood are fast cars and an early death. As directed by Michael Menendian, this Raven production emerges as a tragedy whose suspense builds with Aristotelian inevitability. Playgoers remembering 1994's Never Come Morning now have another opportunity to flinch at the high price of athletic acclaim.
