Off-Broadway Review: The Monsters

The Struggle is Real

Ngozi Anyanwu’s play “The Monsters” will knock you out.

BY CHRISTOPHER BYRNE

Ngozi Anyanwu’s stunning, new play The Monsters now at Manhattan Theatre Club, is the kind of piece that slowly winds itself around your heart, becoming at once both profoundly lyrical and deeply affecting. Very simply, it’s a story of redemption told with grace and simplicity, though that can border on emotional and physical violence at times,  that slowly reveals its complex humanity as two half-siblings free themselves from—and heal—their pasts, to the extent that can ever be accomplished and find a hopeful present…and perhaps future.

Big and Lil are children of the same abusive father. As we see in some flashback scenes Big, who is ten years older, tried to protect his sister, ultimately leaving home when he too was subjected to abuse. He becomes a Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) champion. Lil, who hasn’t seen her brother in 16 years, tracks him down through his fights on YouTube and comes to visit him at his gym. Initially, Big is wary but over time the two forge a relationship as Lil’s passion for the support and commitment to it leads her to become a MMA champion in her own right. It is not a straight line, however, as years lapse between their contacts until ultimately, they have each found themselves and are finally capable of finding one another.

There is so much more to this play, however, than the plot. The metaphors come with the intensity of a body slam. Does Big as a Black man have options? Is he merely reduced to becoming a physical specimen whose only power is in his physicality? His nom de guerre is, after all, “The Monster.” Is Lil allowed to have agency and self-determination? Does society force us to take on roles based on race and cultural myths, and are we trapped in those, even when they are inauthentic to what we perceive to be our true selves?

These are not just important questions for the characters; they have cultural resonance as well. In a performative society dictated in part by images created in social media, is there a way to survive by living our truth? Can we escape from preconceptions and expectations based on how we appear, rather than who we are? Big grapples with this as his career is ending and the path forward is unclear.; who is he when he is no longer “The Monster.” Lil, on the other hand, who begins as open-hearted and loving, loses that to her ambition, and whether she is finally able to find and express that again as she pursues her dream of becoming her own monster when it confronts harsher realities is both fraught and poignant. The divergent character arcs of the siblings create the dramatic conflict of the piece, even as through their individual paths they struggle to find one another. Undergirding all of this is the lifelong dynamic of sibling relationships, which is sharply rendered in some flashback scenes and adds rich dimension to the piece.

Over and above all of this, Anyanwu, who also directed, along with brilliant fight direction by Gerry Rodriguez and choreography of Rickey Tripp, artfully expresses the central metaphor the piece, the physical struggle reflecting internal turmoil. It is the stuff of myth and classicism—the hero’s journey on a gym mat. The intensity of Anyanwu’s production is that one cannot look away, and there were times with both the emotional and physical action, I found myself holding my breath; it’s that intense.

Of course, the impact of this piece is also due to the outstanding performances of the two actors. Aigner Mizzelle play Lil and exhibits an exceptional emotional range. At times vulnerable and others aggressive, there is still a through line of heart that’s evident in every moment. Okieriete Onanodowan gives one of the most beautiful and rich performances of the season so far. From his guarded stance when as Big he firsts encounters Lil and learns who she is to his final moments when he is inching close and closer to an emotional resolution, he gives us the full picture of the man he is, stripped of all externals, who finally shatters the protective carapace he’s felt compelled to place around his heart.

The fighting seems real, which is no small achievement in the intimate theater space, and the thumping rhythms of bodies hitting the mat is underscored by the bass heavy music between the scenes. It’s a percussive refrain that helps create the world of the play.

This is a provocative and thoughtful play that manages to remain deeply human and powerfully moving. Get tickets; they’re worth fighting for.

The Monsters
Manhattan Theatre Club City Center Stage 2
131 West 55th Street, Manhattan
Tues-Sat 7:30 p.m.; Sat, Sun 2:30 p.m. (schedule may vary) through March 22
Tickets from $77 at NYCityCenter.org
95 minutes, 1 intermission

Photos provided by the production © T. Charles Erickson
Posted February 27, 2026