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Blackout Theatre Company’s newest plays each feature a two-person cast, minimal set, the use of a nursery rhyme, a phrase repeated four times and references to a house and season — but the similarities among them end there.
Blackout Theatre Company’s “Stories of Us: A Guide to Home Improvement” consists of three brand-new, one-act plays that each investigate the risks and rewards of companionship. Though each play has its rough edges, they all share an unflinching honesty that never fails to engage.
It’s a bold experiment, inspired by renowned playwright Paula Vogel’s “bakeoff” exercise for creating new works. Troupe members Barney Lopez, Joshua Bien and Shannon Flynn agreed on a few ingredients that their plays should share, and then created three very different plays: Lopez’s “The Ups and The Downs,” Bien’s “Boxes Full of Posey” and Flynn’s “The House That Kyle and Darlene Broke.”
As acted by Jeff Andersen and Lila Martinez — who play the couples in each play — and directed by J. Nicole Duke, the three pieces cohere into one show that is as thought-provoking as it is emotionally moving.
“Stories of Us” begins with Lopez’s “The Ups and The Downs,” which is by far the most structurally adventurous play of the night. Much like the 2009 film “500 Days of Summer,” “The Ups and The Downs” consists of several short scenes that show a couple’s relationship at various stages.
However, in a clever theatrical twist, the sequence of scenes is actually decided by the audience. As patrons enter the theater, they are encouraged to arrange and rearrange pictures on a poster-board. Each picture represents a scene, and the actors gamely perform the play in whatever order the audience has decided. Like a poem whose stanzas have been scattered by a storm, “The Ups and The Downs” gradually becomes clear, painting a complete picture of Jesse and Yolanda and the trials of their relationship.
But the greatest strength of “The Ups and The Downs” also becomes its greatest weakness. Although its narrative structure completely flouts convention and gives the play a thrilling unpredictability, the rapid-fire, staccato scenes also make it difficult for the actors to build and maintain momentum.
When the actors overcome this challenge, however, there are moments when Jesse and Yolanda’s story becomes genuinely touching.
As the run of “Stories of Us” continues and the performers become more comfortable with “The Ups and The Downs,” these moments should occur more often.
In a complete change of pace, “The Ups and The Downs” is followed by Bien’s “Boxes Full of Posey,” a sweet, one-act clown-style show where both Andersen and Martinez display their knack for physical comedy. As Martinez’s clown Syd tries to arrange her boxes of flowers, Andersen’s clown Lux only wants to help. In classic comic fashion, his innocent intentions are constantly frustrated by his clumsiness. “Boxes Full of Posey” is by far the most optimistic piece in “Stories of Us,” suggesting that while companionship may require a little patience, it’s a small price to pay for having a friend.
Nothing, however, quite prepares you for Flynn’s “The House That Kyle and Darlene Broke,” a visceral, raw play that is worth the price of admission alone. The titular couple, Kyle and Darlene, are in a damaged relationship. The brilliant concept of “The House That Kyle and Darlene Broke” is that Darlene implores Kyle to make this metaphorical damage real and punch a hole in the wall of their house. Darlene has covered the living room in gasoline, and the house, like their relationship, could “go up in flames” at any moment. Darlene thinks the only way to save it is to live with the couple’s scars out in the open, where they can’t be denied.
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“The House That Kyle and Darlene Broke” toes the line between real and surreal, often making the audience wonder if any of it is supposed to feel real.
But it doesn’t really matter. Flynn’s play is itself a brutal, physical metaphor for the damage we do to the ones we love. It takes two characters who have hung on to their troubled relationship and surrounds them with a physical manifestation of the emotional “damage” they’ve done to each other. Then the play gleefully asks, how far is too far? It’s a daring, clever work that you’ll be chewing over long after you’ve left the theater.
