Review: Stephen Karam's Fresh, Funny and Chilling THE HUMANS Moves to Broadway

Family holiday gatherings can be volatile enough in real life, but any playgoer will tell you that the mixture of parents, adult children and a special time of the year on stage is a recipe for big trouble.

In his fresh, funny and chilling take on the genre, The Humans, which was just about immediately announced for a Broadway transfer after October's Off-Broadway opening, playwright Stephen Karam believably adds elements of an old-fashioned Irish ghost story to the mix.

The play is set in ninety minutes of real time in a creaky, but spacious duplex apartment in New York's Chinatown. It's around the time when lower Manhattan is still a bit of a ghost town after the events of 9/11 and those without fear of further danger can get in dirt cheap.

Situated on street level and the basement, it's the kind of place that will easily be flooded by any passing superstorm. Appropriately, there isn't much natural light in the new home of twentysomething aspiring musician Brigid (Sarah Steele), who may be more hard-working than talented, and her boyfriend Richard (Arian Moayed), who is recovering from depression and doesn't have long before his trust fund kicks in at age forty.

It's Thanksgiving Day and with the furniture delivery delayed, the apartment's less attractive features are more apparent, such as the loud pounding from the old woman who lives above, the faulty electricity, the creepy sound of the elevator and the presence of very large roaches.

With the arrival of Brigid's parents, sister and grandmother, Richard is about to be introduced to some of the family's Irish-American holiday traditions, but before the visit is over it seems that beloved tradition of telling Irish ghost stories has been replaced by revealing human stories of life's recent disappointments.

Troubled family patriarch Erik (terrific Reed Birney) hasn't been sleeping well lately and is waiting for the right time to explain why to his daughters. His wife, Deirdre (invaluable Jayne Houdyshell), has been depending on religion and food to deal with the family crisis. The pair still live in the Scranton home where they raised their children and aren't subtle about their discomfort with New York.

Brigid's lawyer sister, Aimee (Cassie Beck), who left Manhattan for Philadelphia after the terrorist attack, has had a lousy year, both romantically and professionally. The sharp-tongued aggression with which family members deal with one another is routinely tempered by mutual concern for Erik's mother, called Momo (Lauren Klein), whose mind has succumbed to dementia.

Director Joe Mantello's exemplary ensemble is granted a wonderfully detailed and realistic two-level set by David Zinn, allowing for simultaneous action on both floors. Fitz Patton's sound design perfectly replicates the chorus of noises from city living and orchestrates them into a nightmarish soundscape.

At one point Richard, more or less the observer of the gathering, describes a comic book series about a race of monsters who live in fear of humans.

They may have a point. Stephen Karam sure does.