Review: Sarah Burgess' DRY POWDER, an Aridly Humored Exercise in Corporate Ethics

Sarah Burgess' corporate buyout dramedy Dry Powder may seem as far as you can get from director Thomas Kail's current hip-hop supernova, HAMILTON, but his bracing Public Theater production matches the playwright's vicious verbal chess match with the same abundance of pop and vibrancy.

The intimate, in the round setting adds to the tense energy, and designer Rachel Hauck's blue-washed playing space is a fun move that implies the specifics will be worked out in post-production.

Sharp, but with the cracks showing, Hank Azaria is Rick, Founder and President of KMM Capital Management, a company that chews up struggling businesses and spits them out for big profits. Rick is taking a beating from the New York Times because the company forced layoffs at a national grocery chain while the he was out in Bali for his million dollar engagement party.

Partner Jenny (terrifically unemotional and socially stiff Claire Danes) doesn't see what the problem is ("Of course they're protesting, that's what unemployed people do.") but Rick is nervous about her plans to give a speech at NYU for "a roomful of college kids with Twitter accounts."

Another partner, Seth (John Krasinski) is a softie compared with Jenny, and Rick enjoys forcing them to compete for his favor.

The main problem at hand is a lack of Dry Powder - highly liquid marketable securities - and Seth thinks he can resolve the situation and make nice with the press by striking a deal with a California luggage company and, this time, actually trying to turn things around and allow the current workers to keep their jobs.

The company's president, Jeff (Sanjit De Silva), seems to have his heart in the right place but Jenny smells a desperate rat she can lowball.

Tersely scripted and aridly humored, DRY POWER is a quick-paced exercise in ethics that's highly entertaining from theatre's safe distance.