World Premiere

March 22 - April 15, 2012

 

Written by Lucas Neff

Directed by Marti Lyons

Featuring: Andrew Burden Swanson and Pat Whalen

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At the cold and muddy edges of a ruined lake, Gerry, an actor, and Royall, a writer, engage in a battle of whiskey and wits, but only one knows the true end game. Tense and precise, the play follows the unexpected and dramatic events of a single night between strangers. In this world premiere production, the actors will alternate roles nightly, illuminating the psychological differences of and between each character as well as within the story itself. Neff’s swift, muscular dialogue hammers at the moral constructs of our society and does so with a breathless, unceasing tension that begs the question, “Given the choice, given the chance… what would you really do?”

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"There is something about the exciting, smart, edgy, everything-in-play way Neff writes raw dialogue that constantly pulls your attention and makes you want to see the next thing he writes... Tight direction by Marti Lyons... This play moves at a blistering pace that ensures its talky, static nature does not land it in the lake... Excellent and unstinting."

Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune

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 "A tightly plotted comic thriller with a tense culmination... Marti Lyons helms a well-appointed and smartly paced production."

Time Out Chicago

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"A thoroughly entertaining night of theatre."

Centerstage

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Reader Recommended! "Structural ingenuity, intellectual rigor, and linguistic adroitness give Lucas Neff's dazzling new play a bracing immediacy... Under Marti Lyons's direction, Andrew Burden Swanson and Patrick Whalen rise thrillingly to Neff's challenge, using understatement and indirection to make life-and-death stakes palpable."

Chicago Reader