One of the more pleasing aspects of Nathan Cuckow’s scripts is how subtly his characters worm their way into the audience’s heart. Whether he’s working with Chris Craddock (3 ... 2 ... 1, Bash’d) or alone (STANDup HOMO), Cuckow has an ability to let each individual’s quirks, worries and—especially—flaws slowly win you over, gradually engendering a forgiving sympathy, a quiet but profound understanding that leaves you emotionally helpless as he forces them through the complexities of living.

This talent is on particular display in his latest, 3 Different Heavens. With serious help from Coralie Cairns and Blair Wensley—who both turn in magnificent performances, particularly as the play moves on—Cuckow introduces and then gradually engenders to the audience two conflicted and conflicting women, borderline alcoholic, free-living, urban liberal Susan (Cairns) and  tremendously reserved, painfully delicate Mormon housewife Joyce (Wensley). Brought together by their sons’—who, unbeknownst to Joyce, are lovers—death in a car crash, the two slowly explain how they came to know each other, interspersing reenactments of their sons’ lives together and their intial meetings with running commentary, they take us through the painful realities of relationships, emphasized by the fact they’re both simultaneously losing one of their most important as beginning one of their most strained.

Unfortunately, this running commentary is one of the show’s few weak spots. The self-referential theatricality comes off as slightly gimmicky, but more importantly, the women are frequently slipping out of their “characters” at inopportune moments, puncturing the considerable drama and emotional punch with a conceit that seems largely pointless once introductions are out of the way. Director Trevor Schmidt, who otherwise has a good eye for the script’s rhythms and concerns, is unable to make these scenes work, though he’s hardly to blame: the sharp transitions are simply too jarring to fit in what is otherwise a thoughtful and emotionally potent play.
 
That’s largely why the play gets better as it progresses: the out-of-character moments gradually lessen, and we are instead left with Cairns and Wensley’s easy touches, both as distraught mothers and discombobulated sons. The pair manages to portray the uncertainties of both youth and middle-age with aplomb, the tentative, confused hopefulness of the young lovers giving way to the combatitive resignation of the mothers with a change of lighting, and each managing to turn the character’s flaws into marks of terrible but ultimately beautiful humanity. V

Until Sun, Mar 9 (8 pm)
3 Different Heavens
Directed by Trevor Schmidt
Written by Nathan Cuckow
Starring Coralie Cairns, Blair Wensley