Review: IF I NEEDED SOMEONE at City Garage

“Don’t act like this is your worst date or whatever,” Jules, a young woman says to the man who she has invited into her apartment 30 turbulent minutes earlier. “Don’t even try and tell me that…”

“No,” returns Jim, “but…it’s pretty (expletive) odd.”

Perception being entirely subjective, both characters of the two-character play IF I NEEDED SOMEONE are entirely correct in their assessment of how things are proceeding. And here’s another view: the evening shared by Jules and Jim – for all of its misunderstandings, misperceptions, and bristles, for all the insecurities and past hurts it opens for both characters – is the kind of first date that people looking for love dream of having. That the scenario springs from the mind of playwright Neil LaBute is both fitting and hugely ironic. Having spent decades examining the way men and women cross signals and mess each other over, the author of FAT PIG, REASONS TO BE PRETTY and THE SHAPE OF THINGS has written a play about cards-on-the-table honesty between the sexes…and the surprising results.

The world premiere of this LaBute-ian tango is being staged at Santa Monica’s City Garage where director Frédérique Michel and actors Devin Davis-Lorton and Adam Langsam serve it up with (sorry, Jules) considerable sweetness. Granted, on some levels, this is a talky battle of the sexes tale in which not so much happens, but when the aforementioned battle turns into détente, it’s hugely also satisfying to witness. Much of that satisfaction comes from the efforts of Michel’s actors whose negotiation of this dance (no, the characters never actually dance) just feels right.

We’re not sure where any of this is headed as a loud and very drunk Jules and Jim stumble into her one-room studio and proceed to dig into the beers they have just brought home. “I’m not staying,” is Jules’s first words, until she remembers that they are now inside her apartment. Which quickly turns into her telling Jim “You’re not staying.” Jim has to go. But not yet.

To this, Jim agrees. He’s attracted to Jules, and probably would like to stay and get physical, but he’s also a fundamentally nice guy who isn’t about to be or do the things that most guys in his situation might do. In respecting Jules’s limits, he’s trying to be better than his gender, while also sticking up for them. Which prompts Jules to push back at his view of what women are all about. “Today is better, right,” says Jim. “Mostly the guys getting called out for all the shit they’ve done … That’s progress.” Perhaps.

But has he made progress? Are her expectations too lofty? In between kisses, upchucking, and synchronized beer swilling these maybe lovebirds get their dander raised over the use of phrases like “blame the victim,” “hitting on” and even “sweet.” They hold some things back, but not a lot, and with every derailment, every time someone uses the wrong word, one or the other keeps saying it’s time for Jim to go. Yet he never does, and the conversation-dance or whatever this will ultimately become continues.

Jules and Jim (here’s thinking that the names are not meant to echo the subjects of Truffaut’s film) have physical and emotional scars, some of which they bare. They never refer to each other by name. We get to know a little bit about them - she works in animation; he’s holding a couple of jobs while working to become a therapist. We know they’re both into music (vinyl!) which has brought them together. Not too much else. There may be a loud, vicious world outside of that chic little one room studio (efficiently rendered by Charles A. Duncombe, also the production’s lighting and sound designer), but our everyman and everywoman are safe inside.

Michel’s two performers unpack and unravel these individuals with delicateness.  With his boyish good looks and unaggressive manner, Langsam is so convincingly what Jim claims himself to be – a woke, evolved man – that we spend a lot of the play waiting for the other shoe to drop. LaBute has trained us well in this; the men and women of his plays can get really mean. But Langsam is sporting some serious charisma. Jules’s reluctance to let him depart makes sense.

Equally excellent, Davis-Lorton moves Jules from what first appears to be a drunken party girl looking to pick fights to something deeper, more complicated and certainly more vulnerable. As Jules settles in, finds her footing with this guy in her apartment, changes her outfit and ultimately commits an act of complete trust, Davis-Lorton reveals a lady who can have things both ways.

And as the curtain falls on a lilt from George Harrison, we learn that, yes, she does do sweet. So, ironically, does Neil LaBute.

IF I NEEDED SOMEONE plays through Sept. 8 at  2525 Michigan Ave, Building T1, Santa Monica.

Photo of Adam Langsam and Devin Davis-Lorton by Paul Rubenstein

  

To post a comment, you must register and login.