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A CurtainUp Review
The Way We Get By
By Elyse Sommer
But if his latest, The Way We Get By, is any indication, middle age (he's now 52) has mellowed LaBute a bit. The 80-minute 2-hander is built around a fairly common New York singles story of people meeting up and winding up in the bedroom of one or the other's apartment. For Doug (Thomas Sadoski) and Beth (Amanda Seyfried) their night of sex is fueled by a lot of liquor consumed at a party. The play unfolds on the morning after, which finds both Doug and Beth more uncomfortable with each other than in a cozy glow. Beth is more than just pretty, but nevertheless turns out to be something of a loser. She's allowed her roommate to rule their shared domicile, applying her compulsive need to control everything from the decor to what to watch on TV. The men Beth has been with have left her feeling frustrated about not being loved for her whole person. Her night with Doug is thus an unplanned break in her being on a hiatus from these go-nowhere relationships. In short, though the sex was great, she's unlikely to want or trust this to be something more. This sounds like a perfect set-up for Doug to be one of those Labutian men you love to hate. But though rather immature for a guy who's apparently in his 30s, he's more awkward than awful. Like Beth he's had frequent but consistently unsatisfying hook-ups with the opposite sex, and unlike her he's not a wham-bang runaway guy. Doug is also a talker, and what follows is a verbal sparring fest interspersed with some sexy business that promise a replay of the night before. It's interesting to see LaBute in this less misanthrophic mode and there's a nice mix of humorous banter and poignant yearning here. He also enlivens this sweet but slight comedy with a back story in keeping with his penchant for shocking plot twists. In this case, that surprise element works to expand the familiar boy meets girl structure with a broader reflection on the value systems that determine our life choices — like setting too much store by what people will think, rather than grabbing a chance at happiness. In short, choosing between a fully lived life or, per the title, opting for the way most people get by. Since this isn't an O'Henry story, the twist in this story is introduced well before the end. Consequently I can't go into more detail without risking accusations of being a spoiler. For readers who want full chapter and verse, I'm therefore putting more of the plot details in a text box with a yellow background at the very bottom of this page. To read it scroll down to the bottom of the page or click this : Spoiler Text Link). Thomas Sadoski and Amanda Seyfried (he's a seasoned stage and screen actor, she's a movie star making her live stage debut) manage to project potent chemistry and make us care what happens to Beth and Doug. Sadowski is especially good, fluidly moving from Doug's amusing awkwardness as he stumbles around the strange apartment to his desperate and quite poignant fight to convince Beth that happy endings are possible. The production values are typically top notch as everything at Second Stage tends to be. Director Leigh Silverman sees to it that there's as much movement as possible in this talky play that can't avoid having the actors too often standing and facing each other. And Mr. La Bute proves that beneath all that darkness, beats the heart of genuine romantic. Links to plays by Neil LaBute reviewed at Curtainup: Wrecks Reasons to Be Happy In a Dark Dark House The Shape of Things This Is How It Goes The Distance From Here The Mercy Seat Reasons to be Pretty Some Girls Fat Pig Bash: latterday plays The Money Shot The Break of Noon Land of the Dead This Is How It Goes In a Forest, Dark and Deep
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