Playwright: Joel Drake Johnson. At: Victory Gardens Theater at the Biograph, 2433 N. Lincoln. Phone: 773-871-3000; $20-$50. Runs through: Feb. 20
Once upon a time, there was a nurse named Susan who had two sons, Ronnie and Timmy. Their father died early, leaving her to raise her young boys alone. Eventually, both married and left home, as men in our society are expected to do. But now Ron and Tim need their mother againmore important, they need their childhood home, where they can forget that they're now grown, with grownup responsibilities.
Isn't that the bummer of being a parent? You can't be a kid with real kids in the house! You have to be a mentor, a role model, an exemplary fount of strength and wisdom, for chrissakes! With her offspring enjoying comfortable livesRon is a dentist, Tim sells office suppliesSusan was looking forward to solitary pleasures (like flirting with her Latino neighbor), but even as she resists the re-imposition of caregiver duties, old habits reassert themselves. Ron and Tim likewise revel in adolescent behavioruntil Ron's teenage daughter arrives, bearing messages from his abandoned wife, presently undergoing her meltdown.
When the clan matriarch and the clan baby are the sole rational voices, what you have is either a cozy comedy or a domestic drama hearkening to an age when social problems were discussed on the stage rather than television. Joel Drake Johnson's exploration of middle-aged male unease appears undecided as regards ITS genre, however, making for a deceptively jocular first act (physical slapstick over who gets the bed by the window, for example). But as the source of this regression comes to light, its gravity becomes manifest and with it, our sympathies for adults chafing under the cultural burdens assigned thema phenomenon that Susan eventually reveals to be as universal as it is eternal.
Lazy playgoers may also chafe under Johnson's mid-story mood switch, but director Sandy Shinner steers her seasoned actors through the difficult transitions to create personalities of unanticipated depth. Mary Ann Thebus takes her sweet-old-granny turn into dark corners of maternal ambivalence, while Allison Torem mines levels of emotional complexity belying her own and her character's youth. Steve Key endows Tim with a waifish amiability, but the evening's surprise is Joe Dempsey, whose trademark swagger gradually dissolves into a vulnerability to break your heart as Ron's self-examination reaches its catharsis to provide audiences a poignant teaching moment for our time.