Remy Bumppo’s “Love Song,” with Sarah Coakley Price, Terry Bell/Photo: Nomee Photography
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If this season’s local theater crop has a theme, it’s the imaginary or at least non-human friend, plucked from childhood and transplanted into adolescence or adulthood. The last play this critic reviewed—Deborah Zoe Laufer’s “End Days” at Theatre Above the Law—featured not one but two companions of the non-real variety, namely Jesus and Stephen Hawking. And Theater Wit is presenting a quirky dramedy titled “Inanimate,” by Nick Robideau, which recounts the protagonist’s amorous obsession with a very cute Dairy Queen sign. Maybe this trend is a post-pandemic reaction: as human contact becomes more tenuous and virtual, the soul reaches out in other, stranger ways.
John Kolvenbach’s witty, thought-provoking play “Love Song”—which premiered at Steppenwolf back in 2006 and has been skillfully revived by Remy Bumppo—is an old-fashioned screwball romantic comedy with its own sort of modern metaphysical twist. Without venturing too deep into spoiler territory, it’s clear from early on that Molly, the mystery woman who appears out of nowhere and knocks the cosmically depressed, barely alive Beane for a loop, may not be exactly what she seems, whatever that may be. It’s testament to the show’s loopy sweetness—brought to ripeness by Marti Lyons’ smart and sensitive direction—that it hardly matters who or what Molly “really” is, once her work is done. Somehow, this play takes the hoariest, most overdone of theatrical tropes—the transformative power of love—and makes it fresh and compelling. With its engaging characters, pointed and fast-paced dialogue, unpredictable but logical storyline and luminous poetic flourishes, “Love Song” is a show that will charm the pants off even the crustiest of cynics.
Initially robotic, pathologically introverted and passive to the point of invisibility, Beane (played to eccentric perfection by Terry Bell, himself of string-bean proportions) is the last person one would expect to fall head over heels. Overwhelmed by the world, the deadpan Beane is reluctant even to turn on the light in his desolate, cell-like apartment (part of Joe Schermoly’s clever two-layer set design) because it only makes the dismal grayness of his existence more visible. But once Molly (the formidable Isa Arciniegas, whose portrayal nicely blends larceny, sensuality and vulnerability) literally breaks into his meager life, everything that Beane has suppressed finds explosive release. He ends up falling in love not just with a woman but with the universe, which until now has inspired only discomfort and dread. With Molly as his muse, Beane reveals himself as an artist and free spirit, allowing himself for the first time to take up space. “I used to be flat and quiet,” he declares to Molly. “I was wallpaper. You made me real … All of a sudden, the love songs make sense.”
Remy Bumppo’s “Love Song,” with Ryan Hallahan and Sarah Coakley Price/Photo: Nomee Photography
Beane’s metamorphosis thoroughly shakes up his sister Joan (played by Sarah Coakley Price, who shifts nimbly between hard-bitten yuppie and overprotective sibling), married to the annoyingly rational Harry (a droll and likable Ryan Hallahan). At first glance, the middle-class, verbally dextrous Joan appears better adjusted than her brother, but she has issues of her own, taking out her inchoate frustrations on the office interns she serially hires and fires. She clearly loves Harry, but it’s a Bickersons-type relationship that has lost its spark—until her brother comes out of his shell, leading Joan to recover her own long-since-filed-away libido. Joan’s personality shift is more contrived and less profound than Beane’s, but Price elicits laughs as she shows the tightly wound, workaholic Joan attempting to enjoy a weekday tryst with her husband, a feat that requires a great deal of self-defeating effort. She can’t even slouch right, noting that even dressed in a bathrobe and lying stiffly on the couch, she still feels “a little punctual.”
Like many good love songs, this play is flecked with melancholy, because longing and loss are simply part of the deal. But at bottom, “Love Song” is a heartening, life-affirming work, suggesting that our true needs and desires, no matter how deeply buried, must eventually out, and that art and drama are all about nudging the process along.
Beane and Joan rediscover their bliss through an act of joyous imagination, a kind of play within the play. If hard-hit Chicago theater is to regain its mojo, it will be through well-written, well-executed and well-nigh irresistible shows like this one, which remind us what live performance is all about. This production is, among other things, a love song to theater itself, and those who share that love should make a point to see it.
Remy Bumppo Theatre Company presents “Love Song” at Theater Wit, 1229 West Belmont. Tickets are $10-$52 at (773)975-8150 or RemyBumppo.org. Through April 21.
