unwieldiness

But the “women stick together” turn tightened up a show whose unwieldiness stymied its ability to efficiently deploy the usual hero, villain and loser edits without its fakery showing.

Its unwieldiness is an apt metaphor for memoirist Barbra Streisand, who has tried to control everything since she became a star at 19.

All of which surely helps to explain the unwieldiness of “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window,” a play that we might have looked back on as an early effort if only Hansberry had lived.

But Kanneh-Mason could also be a bit of a ham, his extremities of expression sometimes tipping into an unwieldiness that, as he maintained the overall shape of a phrase, sacrificed intonation along the way.

But the vignettes are brief, and each episode establishes the context of the play in so much alluring archival footage and enriching visual detail that something is gained in the unwieldiness.