Review - In The Wake: Ten Years In The Making

Early on in Lisa Kron's politically-charged romantic comedy/drama, In The Wake, audiences are reminded of a scene that traditionally takes place in many American households every fourth Thursday of November. While the rest of the family is ready to sit down to Thanksgiving dinner, there's one person pleading to keep the television on for just a little longer, obsessed with the score and loudly complaining about the officiating. Only this time it's Thanksgiving Day, 2000 and Kron's central character, Ellen (Marin Ireland), isn't concerned with a football game, but is jumping up and down in front of the MSNBC broadcast, wildly cheering for a come-from-behind Al Gore victory in the contested presidential election.

In several speeches directed to the audience, the East Village activist reveals herself as a person who fears blind spots that can affect the country as a whole ("We're in the broken car and we're broken and we're, like, listening to the radio and... I don't know, sort of idly chatting about, 'hmm, what if this car crashes.' And not registering that it's already happened.") while being unaware of their existence in her personal life. Over the next five years we see her ranting against the George W. Bush administration (key moments of which are projected on the proscenium by Alexander V. Nichols), unaware how her "having it all" idealism parallels what she sees as the self-serving policies of the president.

While nothing is mentioned of Ellen's bloodline family, she seems to have appointed herself as the liberal heart of a cozy family of friends. She lives as a couple with schoolteacher Danny (Michael Chernus, as a loveable, laid back lug), who begrudgingly puts up with her hesitancy to commit to marriage. Her best friend, Danny's sister Kayla (Susan Pourfar), an aspiring political writer who juggles four survival jobs, lives in the same building, along with her wife, Laurie (Danielle Skraastad). When she's in the country, international human rights aid worker Judy (Deirdre O'Connell, terrific as the wry voice of well-reasoned fatalism) is a frequent guest. Kron's entertaining gathering of smart, funny people of varied degrees of left-wingedness is staged with the best Kind of sitcom snappiness by Leigh Silverman.

But Ellen puts her own happy lifestyle in danger when she falls into a romance with filmmaker, Amy (an appealingly cool and low-key Jenny Bacon) and can't decide who she wants to non-commit to while both partners, aware of The Situation, await her decision as she shuttles back and forth between them. (A flaw of the play is that her relationship with Amy is fully seen as mature and sensual while we never get a sense of Ellen and Danny as lovers.) Meanwhile, the rest of her gang are also making life-changing decisions which Ellen only sees in respect to how they change her own comfort zone.

In lesser hands, Ellen would be difficult to sympathize with, but while I can't exactly say they'd love her in Houston, Kron draws her out as an innocent idealist whose passion for saving the world stagnates her ability to fully relate to individuals. Ireland, possessing a unique ability to communicate perkiness and intelligence in the same wide-eyed expression, offers a portrayal that is funny, sweet and painfully foolish. She's especially funny in a scene where Judy's young niece (Miriam F. Glover), makes an offhand remark disapproving of homosexuals, followed by her story of how President Bush made her feel safe on 9/11; the humor of Ireland's reaction is that you can see how Ellen is carefully trying not to discourage the child from expressing herself, while still attempting to change her mind.

In recent seasons New York has seen a plethora of what might be called anti-Bush Theatre. And while his administration is the shadow looming over In The Wake, the play is a refreshingly genuine self-examination from the opposing side.

Photos by Joan Marcus: Top: Marin Ireland and Michael Chernus; Bottom: Marin Ireland and Jenny Bacon.

Click here to follow Michael Dale on Twitter.