An avocado with a few bite marks. The sound of scurrying footsteps overhead. A missing loaf of gourmet bread. These seemingly innocent elements fuel the fears of an upper-class dysfunctional family and lead to tragedy in Bruce Norris' timely comedy-drama The Pain and the Itch, just opened at Playwrights Horizons after a hit run at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company. Norris, a successful actor as well as playwright, weaves together these apparently scattered plot pieces to demonstrate how our government and the media have turned us into a paranoid society.
Power attorney Kelly (Mia Barron) and househusband Clay (Christopher Evan Welch) are obsessed with potential dangers to their home and two small children. They imagine an unseen animal has invaded their posh townhouse (designed with an eye toward excessive consumerism by Dan Ostling). Another source of anxiety is an unexplained rash on a delicate area of their toddler daughter's skin. The rash is only one of many secrets that get under the skin of the characters and provide this witty and pointed play with its title. There are a few logical holes in the script, and a few too many dramatic turning points pivot on sheer coincidence, but Norris offers many deep insights into our fear-wrecked post-Sept. 11 world.
Under Anna D. Shapiro's tight direction, the estimable cast subtly exposes the pain of unspoken longing and the raw wounds that result when emotional itches are scratched. Barron and Welch make crafty combatants in their marital war, employing silences and sidelong glances like weapons of mass destruction. Reg Rogers is amusingly bitter and brittle as Clay's deceptively superficial brother Cash. As she did in last season's Well, Jayne Houdyshell creates an entire life history as the kind of mother who can be equally nurturing and unintentionally destructive. Aya Cash skillfully slips from trashy goofball to poignant war victim as Cash's ditzy Russian girlfriend. Peter Jay Fernandez displays quiet dignity as a mysterious Muslim visitor whose presence is not explained until the final blackout.
Jennifer von Mayrhauser has created character-defining costumes, and Donald Holder's lighting effectively delineates the time shifts.
Presented by and at Playwrights Horizons, 416 W. 42nd St., NYC. Sept. 21-Oct. 8. Tue.-Fri., 8 p.m.; Sat., 2:30 and 8 p.m.; Sun., 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. (212) 279-4200 or www.ticketcentral.com. Casting by Alaine Alldaffer, CSA.