What happens when you bring a stranger home from a bar? What are the inherent risks you assume? These are just two of the provocative questions posed by playwright John Lisbon Wood's intriguing drama, now being performed by Walkabout Theater Company, under the unassuming direction of Gary Zabinski.
Sam and Rita are two strangers who have found each other one Chicago night. Rita, overweight, scarred emotionally by previous encounters with men but hungry for a connection, brings home Sam, an edgy, nervous man who is not her intellectual equal, but in the quest to close the loneliness gap, fits the bill. Rita has used the ruse of a sprained ankle to get Sam to accompany her back to her apartment and at the play's beginning, we immediately see Rita's desperation as she tries to coerce Sam into staying with her, even though it's obvious he's eager to leave. Throughout the course of their night together, secrets are revealed as the two lay bare their souls to one another. Rita gives a hint of past traumas and Sam gives a hint of a very recent trauma, one that poses a great danger to Rita. As the two cautiously make their way towards some sort of rapprochement, the audience wonders if the two will connect or if their imbalances will result in disaster.
Sam and Rita are played by two real-life married Chicago acting stalwarts, the wonderfully low-key Larry Neumann, Jr. and Sandy Borglum, who telescopes Rita's nervous energy and hunger. If nothing else, Disciple is a showcase for these two fine thespians, who give us astonishingly layered and real performances. Becky Marshall's simple set design, along with Steven Conway's lights and Andrew Hansen's evocative sound cues, create a playing field for this terse drama, a simple backdrop upon which the actors write their spare, gripping performances.
Disciple has a short run time: 80 minutes, but in that time, we learn much about their characters and because the tension is so subtle and the performances so fine, we get caught up in their one-night affair and are left to wonder if these two wounded souls will make a connection of love or one of violence and disaster. This is the kind of simple, yet textured drama that benefits from a small space and production such as this one—it's achingly real. At the close of the play, scribe Lisbon chooses to show us hope rather than disaster, as Rita begins to put a positive spin on her uneven encounter with Sam. And we, as an audience, are left enriched by the connection they ultimately make with each other and with ourselves.