Playing at Cinema Center through Sept. 12, the new prison drama Sing Sing stars Academy Award nominee Colman Domingo as John “Divine G” Whitfield, an inmate at the titular New York jail. He’s on the steering committee for the prison’s Rehabilitation Through the Arts program, a real-life initiative that sponsors a theater group for the incarcerated. 

After completing A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Divine G and the rest of the group set their sights on the next project, which they decide should be more comedic and modern after just finishing Shakespeare. The volunteer director Brent (Oscar-nominated Paul Raci) decides to take a pass at a script, which the group agrees should implement disparate themes from time travel to Egyptian pharaohs and a couple monologues for good measure.

Joining the group is Clarence “Divine Eye” Maclin (playing himself), who auditions for the role of Hamlet — albeit a variation on the typical Shakespeare version. Divine G, who just finished playing Lysander and is typically the lead in the plays they put on, is surprised when the committee chooses Divine Eye for the central role. Watching the relationship between the “Divines” develop is one of Sing Sing’s inimitable treasures, beginning as a reluctant tutor-pupil narrative, but slowly morphing into something richer and more meaningful. 

Divine G has been around a while and written several of the scripts the group have used for productions, so he has trouble hiding his jealousy when Divine Eye comes onto the scene. Their conversations start with consternation, segue to reconciliation, and eventually blossom with mutual admiration.

Like Divine Eye, most of the characters in Sing Sing are played by men who were formerly imprisoned and some of whom were members of the real-life RTA. Naturally, this gives the stellar ensemble cast an organic sense of collective purpose and effortless believability. 

Together with cinematographer Pat Scola, director and co-writer Greg Kwedar often frames the inmate characters in close-up, reclaiming the humanity and individuality the prison system has taken from them. Film is a format of faces, and seeing Sing Sing in a theater is to meet face-to-face with people we don’t always get to see on screen. Two characters I was drawn to most are Dino and Carmine, the former a quietly wise colossus and the latter a somewhat neurotic type who sports a nervous tic of wiping his brow, even when there’s no sweat present.

Sing Sing does indulge in dramatic clichés here and there, most notably through a handful of montages that showcase the actors running lines and sets being assembled for Breakin’ the Mummy’s Code, the production they’re putting together. Fortunately, they’re scored by Bryce Dessner, one of the guitarists in the rock band The National, who has also written music for quite a few independent movies the past several years. I’ve generally enjoyed some of his film music, but his work here stands as his most transcendent and life-affirming, enough to make one’s eyes swell even when it’s not accompanied by moving images. 

The themes tend to coalesce around Divine G’s mindset at any given point in the story, often hopeful and tender, but tense and choleric in the wake of an unexpected tragedy with one of the RTA players.

Understandably, the emotional linchpin of Sing Sing is Kwedar tapping into what makes programs like the Rehabilitation Through the Arts so vital to quality of life for those in prison. I couldn’t help but be reminded of the recently released Netflix documentary Daughters, which also centers around incarcerated men, but involves a different program that allows them to reunite with their daughters for a special “daddy daughter dance.” Both films beam with undeniable empathy and hard-fought optimism, showcasing a segment of society that is too often portrayed with preachiness and artifice when present in the movies. 

Sing Sing is a quietly moving reminder of the power that creativity and expressivity have in even the most dispiriting of settings.

New movies coming this weekend

• Coming to theaters is AfrAId, a sci-fi horror film starring John Cho and Katherine Waterston, involving a family who is selected to test a new home digital assistant device that develops self-awareness and interferes with their lives in disturbing ways.
• Also playing in theaters is City of Dreams, a thriller starring Ari Lopez and Renata Vaca, which chronicles the true story of a Mexican boy whose dreams of becoming a soccer star are shattered when he’s smuggled across the border and sold to a sweatshop in the United States.
• Streaming on Netflix is The Deliverance, a supernatural horror movie starring Andra Day and Glenn Close, concerning a family living in an Indiana home who discover strange, demonic occurrences that convince them and the community that the house is a portal to hell.