Isabella Campos, Gene Gabriel, Tyler Lindquist, and Natascia Diaz in One of the Good Ones (Don Ipock)
Remakes of classic properties have been in no short supply in recent years, but Gloria Calderón Kellett’s One Day at a Time easily sits in the top tier of reboots. The Netflix series, which ran from 2017 to 2020, was sweet and hilarious. It beautifully captured the relatable charm of Norman Lear’s iconic family sitcom, seamlessly updating it for a modern audience while centering on a Cuban-American family. Calderón Kellett has once again captured that magic with One of the Good Ones, a modern, Latine-focused take on Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, now running at KCRep.
One of the Good Ones opens on Ilana (Natascia Diaz), a wealthy Latina woman prepping her immaculate Los Angeles home (shout out to set designer Chelsea M. Warren) as she prepares to meet her daughter’s boyfriend for the first time. When a Latino deliveryman shows up with flowers, Ilana trips over herself to be a (wildly unnecessarily) gracious hostess. She profusely apologizes for her inability to speak Spanish, despite being of Puerto Rican and Mexican descent, hurls her life story at him in that uncomfortable, loud-and-slow manner people take on when encountering non-English speakers, and does not stop to consider that this man, Pedro (Rolando Serrano), might speak English in the first place.
And thus the dynamics are laid out, setting the stage for a wide-reaching—and deeply funny—exploration of how class, race, and cultural identity play out at an individual and societal level.
Ilana and her husband, Enrique (Gene Gabriel), are overjoyed to have their daughter, Yoli (Isabella Campos), back home after her college graduation, and they’re excited to meet her boyfriend, Marcos (Tyler Lindquist). He’s from Mexico, Yoli tells them, and his dad works for the Dodgers. What a catch.
So Yoli’s parents—Enrique especially—are taken aback when Marcos arrives with a bottle of wine and an odd choice for a “conversation starter” gift of a piñata, and they see that he is, as Enrique is quick to bluntly point out, “a white guy.” It turns out Marcos’ parents lived and raised him in Mexico, but they had moved there as young adults from Boston.
The biggest issue Enrique takes with Marcos is not necessarily that he’s white; it’s that he’s white but self-identifies as Mexican. That is, after all, where he was born. Enrique, on the other hand, identifies as Cuban but has never set foot in the country. Calderón Kellett doesn’t hold back in her deep dive into the generational differences in how we discuss issues of identity. In their free-flowing, often contentious discussions, neither team is presented as being more or less “correct” in their views; both have extremely insightful points to offer, and both bristle at having their deeply held beliefs challenged.
Through it all, Calderón Kellett’s script—delivered by a superb cast under the direction of Laura Alcalá Baker—keeps these conversations moving as a clip that highlights the humor under the friction, and which allows the heavier moments to land with full emotional impact. There is a definite sitcom feel to the play’s rhythm and structure, and that is in no way a slight. Calderón Kellett proved her mastery of the culturally significant family situation comedy with One Day at a Time, and it’s impressive how well she was able to translate that genre to the stage.
One of the Good Ones runs at the Kansas City Repertory Theatre (Copaken Stage, 1 H&R Block Way) through March 8. For more information, visit kcrep.org.
