Courtesy of Capital Fringe.

Writing in 2012 about the original version of D.C. Trash, Martin Austermuhle eschewed a more conventional lede and went straight to the point. Just go see it, he told readers.

I wish I could say I had similar advice—or even, honestly, that I could tell you the opposite. Instead, I’ve been sitting with D.C. Trash – Recycled, a reboot of the production with original music, for several days without entirely clear feelings about the production.

Perhaps it was because I had such high expectations based on reviews of the 2012 show, which I distinctly remember being disappointed missing at the time, or the perfect promise of the description: fearless commentary on Washington from a “crusty native.”

The gist of the story is that Ron Litman has returned to the District after years away. He grew up here, atop a deli on Wisconsin Avenue with parents who battled each other over the cheese and the cold cuts and relatives who owned business fawned out across the city. Upon returning, he takes a job as a garbage man. Trash, Litman lets the audience know, tells him all he needs to know about us modern Washingtonians. “Why?” he thunders. “Because you keep forgetting to tie the fucking bag.”

Indeed, amid stories of his life as a trash man, musical numbers, and reminiscences from his past, Litman provides some gritty and much-needed commentary about the state of the District as he’s come to find it. “A lot of what I remembered has disappeared,” he laments. “Usually it’s a CVS.”

More than that, he notes the inequities, the assumptions that people have about him versus the ones they have about his African American and Latino coworkers. Without flinching or equivocating, he acknowledges the power and privilege he wields as a white man—and how it has driven wedges in some of his relationships.

But the script also rambles, at times without clear transitions between stories. It can feel like listening to a beloved, and often sharp-witted, but off-kilter uncle. One whose stories are also told with an array of spit.

It isn’t a trash can anymore, he vehemently explains to the audience, it’s a trash toter. We have a laugh as he makes a reference to the giant bins—ahem, toters— a couple of times. But how can a comedy about trash in D.C. not reference the great trashcangate incident of 2014 at least once?

More importantly, what exactly are we to make of his reminiscences? Buried within the (often funny) tales are important, troubling questions about how we handle the uncomfortable effects of Washington’s rapid economic and demographic changes. But they whip between issues of race relations, class, gentrification, and consumer culture so quickly (which, to be fair, is how life is) that you can’t quite make out what Litman is trying to say.

If you’re like me, you’ll leave the theater a little blinkered, wondering what exactly to make of the production and how to process the complicated issues it touches on. Whether or not that is a “must see” is up to you.

D.C. Trash – Recycled is showing at Logan Fringe Arts Space’s Trinidad Theatre. Remaining performances are:

Saturday, July 18 at 6:05 p.m.
Sunday, July 19 at 1:30 p.m.
Saturday, July 25 at 2:15 p.m.
Sunday, July 26 at 4:00 p.m.

See here for more of DCist’s Fringe 2015 reviews.