Review: BECKY SHAW at 2nd Story Theatre

If given the choice between a witty, acerbic, cynic and a genuinely warm, kind, caring, drip, who would you choose?  Why? 

Though over-simplified, these questions are at the core of Gina Gionfriddo’s biting comedy Becky Shaw, which is currently playing at 2nd Story Theatre in Warren, RI through February 20, 2010.

After the death of their father,  Suzanna (Rachel Morris) and Max (Ara Boghigian) confuse intimacy with attraction and have sex - with each other.  Now, Suzanna and Max are not actually, but have been raised as, brother and sister. 

Max is a young, sharp, successful, businessman who is concerned about the future of the family business and is stepping in to fill his father’s shoes.  Suzanna may have felt she needed a father-replacement or a lover, but once-attracted, the duo are just as quickly and forcefully repelled.

Suzanne falls for, and in short order marries, the next guy she dates. Her husband Andrew (Tim White) is an alt-rock, would-be writer / office manager who is as heartfelt as he is humdrum.

Andrew thinks that Max, with his Type A personality, success and sardonic wit would be a perfect match for an aimless, under-employed, though clearly intelligent, woman he works with:  Becky Shaw (Hillary Parker). Finally! The title character… and it does feel a bit like “Finally!”.

The blind date and ensuing interactions are, by almost any standard, save sleeping with your sister after burying your father, a disaster.   It is, I suppose, about perspective.

Ms. Gionfriddo has constructed a deft, intricate, social commentary on wealth and social class and the impermanence of both.  The play flourishes or fails on the ability of the actor playing Max to say the meanest, brutally honest and unnecessary things without turning off the audience.  Max is an asshole, but he has to be entertaining or it doesn’t work.  Ara Boghigian handles the task with delightful self-possession and poise; beyond what we have seen before.

Hillary Parker keeps the mystery about Becky Shaw intact.  Is she really, truly, a shark under all of that birthday cake exterior or is she just misunderstood?

Rachel Morris and Tim White get the short end of the stick as comedic straight men, though both turn in fine performances.

Paula Faber, who can steal a scene out from under any lead actor, especially in a role that calls for it, goes riotously right up to that edge.

Director Ed Shea has produced a sparse and extremely fast-paced and wryly funny production which, mostly, works extremely well. 
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Becky Shaw plays at 2nd Story Theatre in Warren, RI through February 20, 2010.  Tickets are $27 and can be purchased at the Box Office which is located at 28 Market St., by phone at (401) 247-4200 or online at www.2ndstorytheatre.com.

Photo:  Hillary Parker as Becky Shaw and Ara Boghigian as Max
Photo credit: 2ndStory/Richard W. Dionne, Jr

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