Primary Trust

 B+

Eboni Booth’s (Paris, “Julia”) new play at Roundabout’s Laura Pels Theatre has much to recommend it, including a superb cast, a wonderful set, lovely musical accompaniment and sensitive direction. My reservations about it originate with the script, which takes a long time to reveal where it is leading us and is sparing with its dramatic moments. The acting could not be better. William Jackson Harper (After the Blast, “The Good Place”), playing Kenneth, a 38-year-old loner whose hard-won stability is suddenly undermined when the job he has held for 20 years disappears, is so likeable and vivid that he immediately draws us in. Eric Berryman (Toni Stone) makes a believable person out of Kenneth’s longtime imaginary friend Bert. The always excellent Jay O. Sanders (Uncle Vanya, Rhinebeck Panorama) makes the most out of three roles, Kenneth’s past employer, his new employer and a snooty waiter in a white tablecloth restaurant. April Matthis (Toni Stone, The Piano Lesson) plays Corrina, a waiter at Kenneth’s favorite bar who tries to befriend him, as well as other waitpersons and bank customers whom she convincingly inhabits. Luke Wygodny (Hundred Days), on keyboard, guitar and cello, provides unobtrusive but welcome music to support the action. Marsha Ginsberg’s (English) delightful set presents miniature versions of the buildings surrounding the town square of Cranberry, NY. A feature of Qween Jean’s (Black No More) costumes is the use of changing shoes to represent different social roles. Knud Adams (English) directs with sensitivity. One problem that I had was that Harper made Kenneth such a sympathetic character that it was difficult to realize how troubled he really was. A minor annoyance was the overuse of a service desk bell to punctuate scenes. The excellence of the acting makes it well worth seeing. Running time: 95 minutes; no intermission.

 

After the Blast

C+

This new play by Zoe Kazan (We Live Here) at LCT3’s Claire Tow Theater is, as its title suggests, set after a thermonuclear apocalypse that has driven a few of the best and brightest survivors underground where they live in a tightly controlled community devoted to preserving a remnant of humanity and working toward healing the surface of the planet for an eventual return. Their difficult lives are eased by vaping THC or ‘sim’-ing,  i.e., enjoying simulations of former pleasures via chips implanted in their brains. Oliver (William Jackson Harper; Placebo), an important scientist, and his wife Anna (Cristin Milioti; Once) have been turned down four times for permission to have a baby because Anna could not pass the Mental Health Evaluation (MHE) due to her depression. Oliver brings home a helper robot, allegedly for Anna to train to help blind children, and, by her good works, raise her score on the MHE. She at first resists, but then gives in. She names the robot Arthur and grows quite attached to him. It’s easy to see why; he’s a charmer. Oliver and Anna have friends Carrie (Eboni Booth; Fulfillment Center) and Patrick (Ben Horner; Fucking A), who don’t get much chance to make an impression. David Pegram, Will Connolly and Teresa Yenque also have small roles. Oliver’s attempts to do right by his wife backfire. Almost every scene runs on too long, particularly in the first act. The play eventually just runs out of steam and ends rather abruptly which is a shame because it contains much of interest. The premise is fascinating, the cast is appealing, the set by Daniel Zimmerman (Suicide, Inc.) is both functional and attractive and the costumes by Kaye Voyce (4000 Miles, Luce) are subtly futuristic. I could not find a credit for the robot operator which seems an unfortunate omission. Director Lila Neugebauer (The Wolves, The Antipodes), who seems to work best with ensembles, doesn’t seem at the top of her form here. Running time: two hours 30 minutes including intermission.

Fulfillment Center

C-

I would not have been so disappointed with Abe Koogler’s new play at Manhattan Theatre Club’s Stage II if had not started promisingly. For the first 30 minutes or so, I thought it was heading confidently to an interesting destination. Unfortunately, as it progressed, the playwright seemed to lose control of his material and the play ended up at a dead end. In the well-written first scene, Alex (Bobby Moreno; Grand Concourse), the 30ish manager of an Amazon-like warehouse in New Mexico, is testing the speed of a 60ish prospective employee, Suzan (Deirdre O’Connell; By the Water, The Vandal). The interaction between the nice guy stuck in an unforgiving job and the down-on-her-luck ex-singer who desperately needs work is both funny and revealing. In the next scene we see Alex with his longtime girlfriend, the sassy Madeleine (Eboni Booth), who has just moved, reluctantly, from New York to be with Alex until an expected move to greener pastures in Seattle in six months. How they came to be an interracial couple and why they have stayed together almost ten years without even getting engaged are questions that remain unanswered. In the third scene we see Madeleine at the campground where she is staying as she tries to strike up a conversation with John (Frederick Weller; Mother and Sons; Glengarry Glen Ross), a taciturn 40ish carpenter whose most recent girlfriend has kicked him out. In the remaining scenes, each character meets with one of two others. The men never meet and the women never meet. The writing weakens, the play meanders and it finally grinds to a halt. Andrew Lieberman’s set, such as it is, is a long sand-colored platform running the length of the theater plus a couple of folding metal chairs. The audience sits on both long sides of the platform. Asta Bennie Hostetter’s  costumes are apt. Daniel Aukin is a director whose work has included some fine evenings of theater (4000 Miles, Bad Jews, The Fortress of Solitude) as well as some terrible ones (Fool for Love, Rancho Viejo, Placebo, What Rhymes with America?). His work here includes one gesture that I hate: forcing the actors not in the present scene to sit impassively at the edge of the stage in plain sight. It’s always a pleasure to see Deirdre O’Connell. Eboni Booth is a fresh new face. Bobby Moreno makes his “nice guy” role believable. Frederick Weller’s mannerisms annoyed me less than usual. With more work, the play might have amounted to something better. As is, it’s a missed opportunity. I very much doubt that the playwright knew where he was headed when he began. Running time: one hour 25 minutes; no intermission.