This world premiere, a co-production of IAMA and Boston Court and directed by Jessica Kubzansky, is a delicately interwoven script with surprising, beautiful and challenging moments. Anne and David, a long-term couple and the core duo of the story, are on a trip from California to Minnesota to witness the birth of their first grandchild. There is an immediate indication of an underlying, yet unspoken, tension: even though their dialogue has all the markers of the fun tug-and-pull of a loving relationship, there are little pieces of concern and abnormality that let us know that is not their usual cross-country excursion.
And as the play moves through β no spoilers here! Exquisitely interwoven. I immediately noted key similarities in this work β a balance of the personal, imaginary, poetic and factual in a way that keeps the mind moving while still hitting emotional truth.
This is a great example! Using her own experience of driving across the country, Tira fosters two particular aspects of travel to let Anne change. With the travel disruptions, she allows her characters to veer off the planned path and dive into unusual locations that are surprising and allow for new realizations. There are deliberate jumps to locations that are not perfectly on the same highway; and there are jumps to memory locations that echo the past.
The Pando is a network of ash trees in Utah that are genetically the same tree, and what seems like individual trees are actually family branches sprouting from the giant lateral root of the parent. This is similar to the concept of character repetition and modification in the play.
Accidental finding. The more that Anne, David and the other characters took shape, the more this play found its shape and purpose. And the play does have a shape and purpose. For me, it felt like a challenge to understand, forgive, and maintain in the chaos of existence β but in a positive way.
