This local production features a 2009 script by Canadian playwright Daniel McIvor. Each of its three scenes features two of three female characters. All combinations are seen, but we never see them all together.
The three characters are Leda, the mother, (Karen O’Brien), Annie, the daughter (Kristen Einarson) and Carolyn, the therapist (Carly Gallant, who is also producer and director).
The first scene, the longest, is a therapy session between the talkative and frustrated mother and her therapist. The second is a tense reunion between estranged mother and daughter, in which they learn uncomfortable things about each other, and the third features the daughter and the now-former therapist, taking place several months later.
I was not sure of the focus of this play. Was it about how alcoholism (on the mother’s side) or religious fanaticism (on the daughter’s side) can create a family rift? Or was it about the failures of therapy to help a client, or even the therapist herself? Or was this play, written by a man, a showcase of how even women can fail to communicate amongst themselves? So much for the Bechdel test!
Some of the best parts of the play were hearing the venomous one-liners lobbed by either the mother or the daughter, at each other or at the therapist. The therapist, for her part, doesn’t have any verbal bombs, as she maintains a professional distance with the mother or finds her personal boundaries to be a little too porous with the daughter).
As for the particulars of this production, I found the blocking quite static, with a lot of sitting around by the actors and not too much movement, except when things got heated, at which time they moved and then settled into another static arrangement. That was too bad, as the energy by the three actors was strong and compelling as they spoke their lines. Sometimes there seemed to be too many props for the action, especially in the third scene, where an excess of filing boxes were scattered about to indicate that the therapist was moving from her office, even though this was clear from the dialogue.
I liked some of the psychodynamics showcased in this production but I thought it could have used a little more polish.
