Starring Sarah Broude as the unnerving and relentlessly chirpy suburban wife and Kevin McLaughlin as her bored serial killer husband, this series of sketches is a brittle take (a la Albee) on the outer sheen of American life.
It’s creepy, intelligent and funny — you’ll feel some shame for guffawing at the image of McLaughlin smacking a teddy bear with an over-sized dildo. In accord with the trap for this genre, there is certainly some pretension in the script that rears its head; Broude is naturally awesome in her attempts at a heaving sexuality, though, and McLaughlin is just the Fringe’s most lovable child murderer. The scene titles alone (named after 80s song lyrics, those bastions of American pop culture) are worth the ticket.
The show lost me a few times in the repetition of the structure, and I think it made its point much earlier than its final bow. There are approximately 14,732 props in this play, and they smashed us over the head with their nod to consumerism. It was distracting and seemed to be without design. I left feeling a little greasy — which seemed right.
Mimi
