Will (Peter Mark Kendall, left) and Anna (Anna Baryshnikov) in the break room of Hobby Lobby after hours, in Samuel D. Hunter’s A Bright New Boise.
Samuel D. Hunter creates worlds of complexity and heartbreak in the most banal settings. A Bright New Boise, which premiered in 2010 at The Wild Project and is now making its off-Broadway debut at Signature Theatre as part of Hunter’s Premiere Residency, takes place in the windowless break room of a Hobby Lobby in Boise, Idaho. Under Oliver Butler’s skillful direction, with a strong ensemble and remarkable lead performance by Peter Mark Kendall, Hunter’s characters engage in a desperate search for meaning in ways funny, painful, and devastating.
When Will (Kendall), a 39-year-old transplant from northern Idaho, interviews for a job at the Hobby Lobby with the excitable, profanity-prone manager Pauline (Eva Kaminsky), his awkwardness might initially be mistaken for routine nervousness. It doesn’t help that the break-room TV, which usually plays corporate talking points, accidentally cuts to gruesome medical procedures (thanks to a screwy satellite dish, we soon learn).
Leroy (Angus O’Brien, left) angrily confronts Will.
Will’s entire being seems pained, and Kendall communicates this anguish with every movement and a soft yet strained diction. There are hints of trouble in Will’s past, and the first scene unravels one of the mysteries. Will introduces himself to 17-year-old co-worker Alex (Ignazio Diaz-Silverio, making an excellent Off-Broadway debut), who has to be pried away from his headphones, with an abrupt revelation:
Alex: I’m gonna listen to my music now if that’s okay.
Will: Alex?
Alex: (takes off one earbud, annoyed.) Yeah?
Will: I’m your father. When you were born your name was William. You were named after me.
Will has come to Boise with some indistinct hope of connecting with Alex, whom he claims he never wanted to give up for adoption. Alex is angsty and troubled but charming enough that his repeated refrain of “I’m gonna kill myself” seems like the light, exaggerated rejoinder of a sarcastic teenager.
“Baryshnikov is brilliant at bringing out Anna’s oddball personality, punctuating her sentences with a self-lacerating ‘Shut up, Anna.’”
Will, fleeing from a traumatic event at a cult-like evangelical church that he is partly responsible for, is coy about whether his faith has been shaken, and he continues to work on his novel-like blog about the Rapture. Alex’s older brother, Leroy (Angus O’Brien), the biological son of his adopted family, is pursuing a master’s degree in fine arts and wears a T-shirt emblazoned with the word FUCK: “I’m forcing people to confront words and images they normally avoid.” Leroy is terrified that Will’s religiosity will rub off on Alex, whom he wants to see study and pursue music, his passion.
Anna (Anna Baryshnikov), an employee who often hides in the store after closing so she can read in the break room without being tormented by the male members of her household, lives for books. She doesn’t eschew religion, like Leroy, but represents a moderate, liberal, community-based approach to Christianity. She has been fired from seemingly every other chain store in town, including three McDonald’s, and seems resigned to eventually losing this job as well. Baryshnikov is brilliant at bringing out Anna’s oddball personality, punctuating her sentences with a self-lacerating “Shut up, Anna.” One of her scenes in the break room at night with Will, as she inches closer and closer to him as they talk about his blog, is perhaps the best of the play. Thanks to Hunter’s deft writing and Baryshnikov’s nuanced performance, there is no sense of condescension toward Anna, even at moments that generate laughter, such as her mispronouncing Anna Karenina.
Pauline (Eva Kaminsky, center), the Hobby Lobby manager, discusses the situation with Leroy and Alex (Ignazio Diaz-Silverio, right). Photographs by Joan Marcus.
The manager Pauline’s guiding light is business: she emphatically points out that under her leadership, this Hobby Lobby turned itself around and became profitable. While having the characters represent approaches to life through God, art, or commerce may sound schematic, the play mostly unfolds naturally, without prolonged or self-aware debates. The scenic design by Wilson Chin nails the fluorescent drabness and cheapness of the break room, with the vending machines, lockers, and appliances perfectly arranged. Action occasionally moves outside the break room, to the street: these transitions are both seamless and beautiful, indicated by shifts in lighting (by Jennifer Schriever) and sound (by Christopher Darbassie).
Will’s presence initiates a crisis for Alex: are his only options in life drudgery at the Hobby Lobby or vengeful, magical thinking, like his father’s former church? The ending, and particularly a rant that Will gives on liberalism, might feel obvious or too on the nose, but Kendall’s performance is so strong that it also feels terrifying, and even tragic, not because of his own aggrieved, narcissistic self-destruction, but because of the damage to others it leaves in his wake.
A Bright New Boise runs through March 12 at Signature Theatre (480 W. 42nd St.). Evening performances are at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday–Friday and on Sunday, and at 8 p.m. on Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday. For tickets, visit signaturetheatre.org or call (212) 244-7529.
