by Richard Campbell, Special to The Epoch Times

Local playwright David Lindsay-Abaire’s play “Rabbit Hole” in lavish production at The Huntington Theatre main stage until December 3rd, is a touching script that while slightly out of the emotional depth of the writer’s tragic abilities, show cases fine comedic dialogue, and a few powerful performances. Nominated for Tony Awards in New York, this play marks a homecoming for the playwright who was asked by mentor Marsha Norman to write about what frightens him. Mr. Abaire conjures a drama about a couple who lose their four year old son in a freak accident. It is an admirable script that falls just short of brilliance.

Mr. Abaire, who is a member of the prestigious New Dramatists, raises great expectations, that are not entirely dashed. The story takes place in Larchmont, New York, where a couple with an otherwise pristine life are forced to face senseless death within the confines of an extended family carrying emotional baggage. We open with a cleverly dynamic kitchen sister chat between younger space cadet Izzy, skillfully played with quirky defiance by Geneva Carr, and Becca, the mother of the deceased son, portrayed with stern, but wounded self possession by Donna Bullock. Izzy has cold cocked a women in a bar over an affair she is having with the woman’s husband- to whom Izzy is now pregnant. Becca succumbs to the idea that despite its Jerry Springer like origins, the event of Izzy’s expectant child may spark a new beginning, and offers the clothes of her deceased son Daniel in the event that it is a boy. Izzy, perhaps not in the position to refuse such generosity, does so on the grounds of weirdness. Despite this soap opera like beginning, the script is laden with very clever dialogue, and the solid sister bonding is a joy to witness.

By the time Becca’s husband Howie, portrayed with earnest woodenness by Jordan Lage, begins his quest to try to move beyond their child’s death, and break the eight month moratorium on sexual relations with wine and Al Green music; we’ve crossed the Rubicon into comically repressed melodrama. The truly bright spot of the first act comes from Becca’s mother, Nat, with an exquisite characterization wrought by Maureen Anderman. The double edged drama that she too has lost a son, although he was a thirty year old heroine addict, provides the nexus for her advice and intervention into the couple’s quandary- masked in hilarious commentary on the Kennedy’s and the meaning of hubris. Veteran Maureen Anderman provides a strong center to this ensemble, bringing emotional focus to revelatory scenes. Nat’s efforts to edge her daughter out of remorse to rejoin the world more successfully transports the play to it’s conclusion than the inter-marital relations.

We are expecting a transference of emotion in the relationship of Howie and Becca that never rightly occurs because the catalyst at the center of the play, (the unexpected visit from the young high school student, Jason who accidentally killed their son while driving down the street,) falls short for a myriad of reasons. Jason, who broaches the rabbit hole concept of the universe in a science fiction story, doesn’t adequately ramp up the couple’s motivation for a resolution. If the incomprehensible nerdy stage presence of Troy Deutsch as Jason lacks the power to provide the platform for the couple’s emergence, some of the blame may be placed in director John Tilinger’s lap, who squelches second act penultimate moments with static staging.

The rabbit hole refers to a parallel universe that is the escape hatch the playwright fails to exploit fully. That such a realm may exist for all of us as deduced by science, where our lives, or something like them, may be playing out simultaneously is indeed an ingenious premise for a play. It is the place where a couple who looses a young child may find themselves comforted; but simply imagining themselves beyond a life trying to accept their loss gives us a rather anti-climatic ending. The brilliant idea that represents the thematic title of the play, is more of a second act footnote, allowing painful emotions to hang in the air, rather than delivering a resounding catharsis. Nevertheless, the production values bespeak The Huntington’s consistently high standards, and reveal a gifted playwright poised on the verge of mastery.

Richard Campbell is a playwright from Boston Massachusetts, you may view writings
and graphics by him at http://home.earthlink.net/~photocafe/