Fringe, Reviewed: Marbles

[ theater ] 

Marbles, by Hannah Van Sciver

Attended: Sat., Sept. 13, 8 p.m.; closes Sept. 14, 2 p.m. (sold out)

Marbles is a two-person play about an unconventional romance, set against the backdrop of the Information Age. Staged with care in the basement of Chapterhouse Coffee Shop, it explores anxiety, love, technology, and the strange area of overlap between the three.

WE THINK:

The basement of Chapterhouse is small. Really small. Only about 20 people fit into the area where Sam Sherburne and Hanna Van Sciver played out Van Sciver's script, one framed, perhaps, by the quotation printed in the back of the program: "I simply regard romantic comedies as a subgenre of sci-fi, in which the world created therein has different rules than my regular human world." Mindy Kaling said that, god bless her.

And Marbles riffs quite successfully on that notion: The two actors deftly navigate a 40-minute performance filled with quick scene changes that shift back and forth between "present" and "past" (in play time, that is), the overarching topic being their relationship in all its awkwardness, excitement and sadness. It was sweet and relatable, with a combination of "done to death" statements about the nature of romance and poignant, unique riffs on this technology-obsessed age in which we live and love. Van Sciver's take on cell phones being "this generation's cigarettes" hit home (Maureen Dowd made that comparison long ago, but whatever), especially considering her very gifted acting--she was remarkable and real in her portrayal of the cool, quirky girl working in the post office who also has moments of extreme anxiety, snarkiness and total weirdness.

Sherburne shined too as the well-meaning, sort-of-awkward guy in love with her (Sam, I can't be the first to say you're a dead ringer for Paul Giamatti, right?). The rapid-fire nature of the scenes, each like a quick snapshot into these two people's lives, kept things light and interesting, and never provided us quite enough information, allowing us instead to fill in the gaps in their timeline -- a relationship viewed from the outside. We never really know what's going on in other people's love lives, but we do know just how complicated, beautiful and painful they really can be.

P.S. While the audience filtered into the small basement space, Van Sciver and Sherburne were posed, waiting for the cue to start. It seemed to take forever, and Van Sciver was sitting on a couch with headphones on, while Sherburne stood behind her, shining a flashlight on her head (and, hey, holding a copy of City Paper in hand!). I was very, very concerned that this was the entire play, since so many quiet, awkward minutes passed before the show truly began. Thankfully it wasn't. Forty minutes of two people "performing" by sitting still in silence? You wouldn't really do that to us, would you, Fringe? WOULD YOU?