It’s more than a coincidence that Dave Barton’s staging of this 2006 black comedy, which concerns the aftermath of a famed artist’s horrible accident, comes off like a piece of performance art. Mark Ravenhill’s script explores the culture of the world of a group of visual artists who fancy themselves bohemians but are, in reality, just as hungry for recognition, wealth, and fame as almost everyone else. The defining moment in the lives of the story’s seven artists—each referred to in the program as 'Ensemble'—occurs when the most commercially successful of them (Jessica Lamprinos) launches herself into her new swimming pool without first bothering to check whether it has been filled with water. It hasn’t, leaving her a bundle of broken bones, cuts, and bruises. Eventually, the collective mind of her six friends and colleagues hits upon the idea of using photography to document her brush with death, a chilling notion fully embraced by Lamprinos’ character, who runs each photo shoot like the skilled professional she is.
Barton’s realization of this thin framework makes rock music and carefully choreographed movement equal partners with the text. In these areas he’s assisted by Melita Ann Sagar and Lee Samuel Taang, credited as the show’s co-directors and co-choreographers. The 75-minute play touches upon questions of friendship, loyalty, idealism, cynicism, death, and immortality. Like most of Ravenhill’s angry-young-man, in-your-face dramas, this one is Darwinian: The world is a cold, unfeeling place where only the strongest, most aggressive, and most cunning survive. Lamprinos’ character is an ingenuous free spirit whose success causes her six closest friends to feel only hatred and envy. Giving voice to the sextet’s complex feelings and reactions is the accomplished ensemble of Christopher Basile, Peter Balgoyen, Keith Bennett, Sean Engard, Terri Mowrey, and Alexander Price. Yet, however provocative and thought-provoking, Ravenhill’s vision is, in the end, thin and just a little clichéd.
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