Parking Lot Lonely Heart: Money Changes Nothing

In Colin McKenna's new play Parking Lot Lonely Heart, Mickey (John Greenleaf) hires a fancy escort (Lillian Wright), and then doesn't want to do anything with her but drink and chat.  Louise, the escort, is naturally resistant to this.  They leave the car and spend a chatty night in an airport hotel, during which it comes out that Mickey is spectacularly rich after being hit by a city bus.  He tried to use the money to fix his life, eventually taking in his daughter Emma (Jamie Proctor), from his previous marriage, hoping to get her off the drugs and protect her.  Didn't work out (for reasons that are later revealed), and now she's homeless, pregnant, and huffing paint with her psychotic boyfriend Larry (Craig Lee Thomas).  Mickey knows Emma is in trouble, but doesn't know how to help her, and Emma in any case doesn't want his help.  He looks to Louise for answers, and sometimes as a surrogate daughter that he can "protect".  McKenna's play is immensely sad; though there are occasional glimpses of humor, there's not much relief from the gritty and overpowering pain that everyone is going through.  At times the depressing turns of plot become overkill, though the play is still affecting at many points. The story is told in an impressive non-linear style.  Kudos go to McKenna and Wright for not making Louise into a "magical prostitute" (though she is still the most together character on stage), but endowing her with a real personality.

The four performers inhabit their messed-up personages with finely drawn characterizations.  Philip Emeott's direction is fluid, making great use of starkly-lettered projections to set the scenes.

The play is in repertory with Tennessee Williams' Summer and Smoke and Eric Overmyer's Native Speech.

Parking Lot Lonely Heart

by Colin McKenna

Boomerang Theatre Company's 10 Anniversary Rep Season

At CenterStage/NY

48 W 21st St, 4th Floor

Tickets $20 or season pass of $35 to see all three plays.  Purchase online at Theatermania.com or call 212-501-4069 for reservations and information.

HttP://www.boomerangtheatre.org for full repertory schedule.