Yen Lunges At You

The MCC Theater production of Yen will either grab you hard or annoy you even harder. Yen is  is a gritty story, which rips at yoru heart and assaults your ears and eyes. If you enjoy that, it is a terrific show – I loved it. If difficult working class British accents punctuated by set changes filled with electronic music and flashing images sounds terrible, then you should avoid it.

Justice Smith, Ari Graynor and Lucas Hedges in Yen

Lucas Hedges and Justice Smith play  half-brothers Hench and Bobby, left to fend for their own in public housing by a mother who is pursuing a new husband. At 16, Hench is the nominal adult of the duo. His brother Bobby is 14 and registers on the lighter side on the ADHD / Autism scale. The boys consume on-line porn, violent video games and subsist on stolen food in between visits from their grandmother, which hasn’t happened in weeks. They inhabit their mother’s council flat with Taliban - a loud and angry dog, cooped up in the boy’s bedroom.

Ari Graynor, as the mother, shows up haphazardly to sleep off the occasional bender, borrow money, or steal things to sell. Manipulative and jealous of Hench’s relationship with his brother, she plays the boys off each other in an emotional game where there are no winners.

A love interest arrives in the form of Jennifer (Stefania LaVie Owen), a girl from the estate housing across the street. Jennifer's father died and her mother collapsed under the pressure. Unable to survive at home, they moved to Feltham. They now survive, unhappily, in her uncle’s apartment. Jennifer shows up on the boy's doorstep one day to rescue Taliban, but ends up trying to rescue the boys and herself. She becomes a sort of Wendy, casting the brothers in the role of the petty criminal lost boys.

Stefania LaVie Owen and Lucas Hedges

The acting in Yen is fantastic. Lucas Hedge does a slow burn and walking desolation that is moving and real. He pops to life in rapid bursts to save his brother, but those bursts quickly burn out, leaving him even more deflated. Jennifer awakens something new that Hench can’t begin to express. His life has been so devoid of love and denuded of affection that he doesn’t have the physical vocabulary for it. Stefania LaVie Osen is properly enigmatic and as wistful as a damaged girl can be. Jennifer is hope personified for the boys - so pure it cannot last. Ari Graynor is a terror as a mother, until you see the terrified child-like woman underneath. Finally there is the portrayal of Bobby by Justice Smith: he is wound up like a puppy on cocaine. I found it scarily real and heartbreaking – but fair warning, others might see overacting.

Yen is played out in a sad sitting room of a council flat in Feltham, and with top notch scenic design by Mark Wendland. The downfall of a British play can be the accents. I lived for a bit not far from Feltham, and the accents were very well done, even down to Stefania’s Welsh bite - Stephen Gabis was an excellent dialect coach. Director Trip Cullman doesn’t hurry the show, but viewers expecting a steady stream of action will be disappointed. Those viewers that are willing to see the human dramatic tension underneath will be richly rewarded by Yen.

Yen | Playwright: Anna Jordon | Director: Trip Cullman | Cast: Ari Garynor, Lucas Hedges, Stefania LaVie Owen, Justice Smith

Assistance @ Playwrights Horizons (thru March 11)

Assistance @ Playwrights Horizons

Assistance, now on stage at Playwrights Horizons, opens frenetically with two men sparring at/to each other in a shared language of puns, jokes, expletives, and verbal shorthand.  It races with such a rapid fire pace that the audience is left wondering if they will ever catch up.  Your ear has to attune to the cadence, in much the same way it takes a few minutes of Shakespeare before the viewer settles into it.

Those audience members that do fall into the rhythm and mindset of these men, they are rewarded with play that engenders a sense of camaraderie and fun set in the cut-throat world of entertainment personal assistants. Those audience members that are easily offended, too empathetic or don’t catch on quickly to the slang and speed of the delivery tend to drop out of the proceedings, which is too bad.  Because Assistants is about more than just crazed office workers, it is about the lengths we go to reach our dreams. And how we cling to those dreams, even after they fall short of our expectations.

The boss, a sadistic self-important and border-line psychopath, but powerful entertainment executive, is never seen.  It is his whims, frustrations and rules which drive the people on stage into fits to meet his requirements.  Michael Esper and Virginia Kull bring life to Nick and Nora, the central pair of executive assistants.  These two give voice and reason as to why someone would choose this job.  Nick guides Nora through the Byzantine rule set to please, or at least not anger, the un-seen Mr. Weinberger.

Virginia Kull & Michael Esper as assistants in Assistance

The rest of the cast, including Bobby Steggart and Lucas Near-Vergrugghe, are excellent – they show up for some magical moments, in roles as the assistant de jour.  Amy Rosoff and Sue Jean Kim play female assistants very well, although they are given pretty one dimensional roles to fulfill.

The sets (David Korins) are great, and provide an appropriate claustrophobic environment; big enough to lose something important, but not big enough to provide relief.  And Director Trip Cullman moves the cast very well inside of this new play by Leslye Headland.

But as good as the cast is, the point of the entire show hangs just out reach.  Is this elaborate game an appropriate, or useful, try out for the next job?  Is it a story of power gone mad, and the lengths people will do to achieve it?  Is it a morality tale; be careful what you wish for?  Or it is it the tale of the lifecycle of a relationship, albeit not a romantic one?  The ambiguity of the point can be fascinating, and it was in Assistance.  But an audience member looking for a more black and white experience could find Assistance frustrating.

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Assistance at PlayWrights Horizons

Playwright: Leslye Headland

Director: Trip Cullman

Cast: Michael Esper, Sue Jean Kim, Virginia Kull, Lucas Near-Verbrugghe, Amy Rosoff, Bobby Stegger

Runs Through: March 11th

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