Midway through Liz Flahive's sadly comic tale, Grace (Julie White), after nervously cleaning spots on the kitchen floor, suddenly -- and very deliberately -- pours a glass of milk on this same floor. The centerpiece of a family that is already two stops past dysfunctional, Grace is snapping. She certainly has lots of spilt milk to be crying over. Her disturbed son, Kenny (Tobias Segal), has done something at school that necessitates constant adult supervision and no sharp objects. Her assertive daughter, Lauren (Aya Cash), is nonchalantly sleeping around, and her younger second husband, Daniel (Brian Hutchison), is wistfully wanting to make Grace pregnant. Enter unannounced Grace's kindly sister, Caroline (Arija Bareikis), an itinerant former member of the Peace Corps who has recently descended from a mountain. The arc of the play covers the preparation by loose cannon Kenny of an apology he must make to the entire high school.
What did Kenny do? What will Kenny say? The former we learn; the latter we never hear. Adding to the mix is Charlie (Will Rogers), a geeky suitor for Lauren, and Kate (Jenni Barber), a quisling in the guise of a perky helpmate. On view are several kinds of craziness, ranging from the shadows of the seriously troubled Kenny to the lighter eccentricities of Charlie's wooing technique. Most of the time, Flahive successfully walks a knife edge between nervous-making neurosis and caring comedy. Compare and contrast: the darkness of the scene in which Caroline asks Kenny why he did it and the inappropriate sunniness of Grace finding herself in a police station.
Flahive is particularly adept at presenting the dialogue of awkward adolescents in our contemporary world, a world where the blundering young will brazenly spout any provocation while actually meaning something else. For those who are weary of yet another dysfunctional American family, it should be noted that the playwright, while flirting with the serious, never departs too far from her basic comic intentions. After all the mayhem, Flahive's indicated outcome may be too suddenly rosy for some.
The cast, under Leigh Silverman's astute direction, is first-class. White encompasses the play's two contradictory impulses with consummate ease; watch how effortlessly she moves from comedy to pathos and back again. Segal makes Kenny both convincingly scary and touchingly real, and Rogers provides a quirky comic presence in his every scene.
Presented by Manhattan Theatre Club in association with Ars Nova
at New York City Center Stage I, 131 W. 55th St., NYC.
April 16-June 8. Tue.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Wed., Sat., and Sun., 2 p.m. (Additional performance Sun., April 20, 7 p.m.)
(212) 581-1212 or www.nycitycenter.org.
Casting by David Caparelliotis.