Written by Lillian Hellman

Directed by Sarah Gross

At Cabot House

This weekend and next

INCEST. Drugs. Crime. Fornication. Impotence. Knives. Blood. Interracial sex.

Lillian Hellman's Toys in the Attic has all of these. Yet the point of this Tennessee Williams-style southern potboiler is not to shock, but to tell a story of the destructive power of greed, anger, and jealousy--and of the equally destructive power of naivete, truth and love.

After a year's absence, Julian (Dan Rapport) and his new wife Lily (Ellen Bledsoe) pay an unexpected visit to Julian's spinster sisters Anna (Nora Jaskowiak) and Carrie (Sara Melson). Julian, who has become suddenly and mysteriously rich, showers his wife and sisters with gifts, but the women are unhappy because Julian's newfound independence upsets the balance of his relationships with each of them. Lily's anxiety is compounded by the presence of her estranged mother Albertine (Katherina Urso) and her mother's lover, Henry (Lisa Garmire).

In Hellman's script, Henry is a mulatto man, not a white woman, but Director Sarah Gross says She decided that the interracial sex that might have shocked Toys' original audiences 30 years ago would not shock modern audiences as much as lesbianism would.

But Gross could not have found a worse actress to play Henry than Garmire, who becomes part of the brick wall she leans against in each of her scenes. Even if her performance had had any life in it at all, and even if there had been any chemistry between her and Urso, it is still unlikely, in the wake of Gay and Lesbian Awareness Week, that lesbianism would shock a Harvard audience.

Gross should have spent less time worrying about shock value and more time getting performances that are expressive enough to sustain the play's angst and tension for nearly three hours. In that length of time, none of the women can find any way to express nervousness other than clutching at their skirts, or any way to express happiness other than pirouetting.

If one is willing to excuse such gesticulations, as well as the new Henry, one may find the Cabot House production of Toys in the Attic suspenseful and powerful. Whether or not it shocks the audience, Hellman's tragedy remains an intense, disturbing play.