Review - Hunters and Gatherers: Slaves of Craig's List

When Tama Janowitz coined the phrase "Slaves of New York" with the title of her 1986 collection of short stories, she was referring to how the lack of affordable apartments in the city flings people into quick romantic commitments or has them cling onto unhealthy ones for the sake of having a place to stay. In Brooke Berman's cleverly titled Hunters and Gatherers, a reference to societies that seek out food rather than farming, the real estate market hasn't grown less competitive but the computer age (especially Craig's List) has made it easier for people to hop around various short-term situations when the opportunities to plant roots are bleak and to escape the bad ones with a few mouse clicks and a successful interview.

Primary Stages' premiere production of the piece is particularly blessed with the direction of Leigh Silverman (Well, Yellow Face), who (without discrediting her more dramatic work as in The Treatment) seems to have established herself as the go-to director for drawing out the quirky and intellectually hip. Her very good cast and bouncy production for this romantic comedy effectively covers the slightness of the material most of the time. The play is funny, absolutely, but this is an evening where characters lean toward being little more than vehicles for clever remarks ("Park Slope is this really funny part of Brooklyn where everyone pretends they live in Woodstock.") leaving the characters too underdeveloped to sustain interest for an intermissionless ninety minutes. By the time the play approaches its finish you may find yourself impatiently waiting for the jokes rather than involved in the plot's resolution.

"This is a list of all the apartments in which I have lived in the past fifteen years that I have been alone, I mean, an adult," says Ruth (Keira Naughton) before presenting us with a slide show of over 20 New York apartments. (Not to mention several on the west coast and a vacation cottage in Vermont.) Her latest abode is in Queens, where she's house-sitting for a Canadian actor she just met at the public library who she's kissed, but isn't certain if that happened before or after he offered her the roof. Ruth is trying to get over her breakup with Columbia professor Jesse (Jeremy Shamos), who she didn't know was married while they were dating. Her best friend, Astor (Michael Chernus), whose living situation generally consists of sleeping on friends' couches, happens to be Jessie's half-brother.

Meanwhile, the newly divorced Jesse has moved into a new place and is soon approached for a date by the pretty, not-yet-of-legal-drinking-age student, Bess (Mamie Gummer), who is unhappily sharing a Brooklyn apartment with six roommates. Naturally, Bess and Ruth eventually become friends, although neither knows of the other's relationship with Jesse, meeting in a bar and bonding over a video game that allows you to shoot at virtual animals.

We've seen these types many times before, but the ensemble plays the comedy well and keeps the evening entertaining. Naughton is very funny and endearing as the smart, neurotic, hopeful romantic who keeps getting stepped on by unworthy men. Chernus' philosophical charm makes Astor too likeable to even consider calling him a slacker. Shamos, an actor who can shine with wide-eyed optimism that hides unexpressed emotions, can almost make you forgive his character's infidelity and Gummer gives the right amount of innocence to her role as the young woman developing her predatory nature by using her looks to her advantage.

David Korins gets some good laughs from his set, consisting of stacks of boxes, a few of them packed with surprises, forming a New York skyline.

Hunting and Gathering boils down to another New York love story filled with smart and funny people, the kind of comedy this Upper West Sider will always have a soft spot for. If not completely satisfying, it's still amusing, and the image of Manhattan beneath a starry sky is the kind of finish will always send me out with a sentimental little glow.

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From Wardhouse Monk's Matinee Tomorrow, published in 1949:

The League of New York Theaters came into being, with one of its objectives the control and the suppression of theater ticket speculation. The purpose was a noble one; racketeering in tickets has long been one of the theater's evils. But how can it ever be eliminated as long as a visitor from the midlands - a wealthy and high-pressure individual, say, from Des Moines or St. Paul or Denver - gets off a plane or train at six o'clock and wants to see the best show on Broadway at eight-thirty? Wants to see it and is willing to pay $20 per seat. Or more.

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