Review: The Fisherman/Stage Left Theatre

Michael Pacas and Sandy Elias/Photo: Johnny Knight

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Are you a trout or a carp? Believe it or not, it’s a fundamental question in this new play by Jayme McGhan, which leaves no fishing metaphor unturned. The show begins innocently enough as a comedy about a family of fishing enthusiasts in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area. But it suddenly becomes deathly serious when the two airline-mechanic brothers Carl and Chucky learn that they’re about to lose everything in a series of layoffs that will affect them as well as 500 of their coworkers.

The play is more than timely, with echoes of Occupy Wall Street and the 99%, the play ultimately comes down to how this family copes with the news. In fact it’s an almost overfull ode to the American Dream, this time writ small and embodied by a piece of land on the shores of a lake. But by the time you discover how Carl has taken matters into his own hands, you either have to swim past the play’s bait, or swallow it, hook, line and sinker. (Neal Ryan Shaw)

Stage Left Theatre at Theater Wit, 1229 West Belmont, (773)975-8150. Through April 1.