Reviewed by Quinn Marquardt
Friday 15 August 2008
***** (five stars) Set in the Upper East Side during the 2003 blackout, The Permanent Night focuses on the tumultuous relationship between Spencer and his wife, Heather, as they wait in their darkened apartment for his troubled little sister to arrive. A deeply satisfying emotional roller coaster, with peaks of gut-wrenching laughter and lows that bring you close to tears, The Permanent Night bridges the harsh realities of a helter-skelter world with the intimately personal struggles of coping with death, betrayal and shame. “Everything that happens to you leaves an indelible mark—a tattoo, if you will,” notes playwright Kari Bentley-Quinn in the program, but her play more intriguingly suggests that impermanence gives life its value and meaning. (The inseparability of love and loss empowers each of them: If something lasts forever, can it still be precious?) Are the intoxicating effects of this play indelible? It’s too early to say, but they stay with you long after the closing scene.
Friday 15 August 2008
***** (five stars) Set in the Upper East Side during the 2003 blackout, The Permanent Night focuses on the tumultuous relationship between Spencer and his wife, Heather, as they wait in their darkened apartment for his troubled little sister to arrive. A deeply satisfying emotional roller coaster, with peaks of gut-wrenching laughter and lows that bring you close to tears, The Permanent Night bridges the harsh realities of a helter-skelter world with the intimately personal struggles of coping with death, betrayal and shame. “Everything that happens to you leaves an indelible mark—a tattoo, if you will,” notes playwright Kari Bentley-Quinn in the program, but her play more intriguingly suggests that impermanence gives life its value and meaning. (The inseparability of love and loss empowers each of them: If something lasts forever, can it still be precious?) Are the intoxicating effects of this play indelible? It’s too early to say, but they stay with you long after the closing scene.
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