Lunge, Grip

Written and directed by Eric Kaplan

At Mather House tonight and tomorrow

UP IN THE SQUARE, Blue Velvet is nightly revealing the dark underside of small town life. Down in the basement of Mather, an even darker underside is being exhibited. Lunge, Grip is the nightmare play of every Harvard-Radcliffe student. It's the world of "incestuous" collegiate relationships brought to the stage. Though never stated explicitly in the play, Kaplan has clearly drawn upon the Harvard experience for this production.

Lunge, Grip's title roughly corresponds to order of the acts. In Act One, the characters desperately lust and lunge after one another, and all parties succeed in ending up thoroughly frustrated. In Act Two, the characters seize on to relationships and grip the life out of them. The staging is as sparse as you can get--amidst the heat ducts of Mather basement, the audience gets caught up in the claustrophobia.

Act One is a little gem of a piece, a solid effort from writer-director Kaplan. Scenes are quick and to the point. Friends Neal and Brad (Will Provost and Matthew Schuerman) encounter Bevvy, the clinging woman (Karen Petrone); Alyssa, the Cold Pretentious Artist (Sarah Beck); and Lynn, the "mature" but power concerned puppeteer. All roles are performed soundly, with particular realism coming from a "golly-gee" Provost and the emotionally distant Beck. I'm not sure if Petrone's Bevvy is quite what was aimed for or not, but she does get a sense of "clingingness" across in any case. Schuerman impersonates the worldly beer-drinking buddy with recognizable accuracy.

Act Two, however, drags us through the long rise and fall of relationships at slow speed. If Kaplan wished to subject us to the real life agony of watching love decay, he came close, but he may have oveextended his dramatic resources. Act Two is largely humorless, and coming after the sharp first act makes the play seem far too long--it might do so even by itself. Though the acting does not falter, it is boring to watch, because it has less to convey. The character transitions are a little shaky as well. The ending is not so much a resolution as a truce, and while perhaps no other ending would do, such a conclusion does not satisfy the audience.

Though Lunge, Grip is Harvard's romantic version of No Exit, there is in fact an escape from the Mather basement. So, grip the first half of this play, then lunge for the door. Half a good, original play is better than nothing.