“Fever Dreams (of Animals on the Verge of Extinction),” at TheaterWorks Hartford , is a naturalistic relationship drama that is also a high-tension suspense thriller.
Deep romance is tempered with adultery, deceit, sexual roleplaying and violence. It’s all about passion, and the three-person cast plays every scene as passionately as possible.
This new play by TV writer/producer Jeffrey Lieber (a Chicago stage actor in the exhilarating theater scene of the 1990s) pays stylistic tribute to the intense, shouty works of Sam Shepard, David Mamet and Wallace Shawn, except those writers didn’t generally write wild love stories or create female characters who can hold their own against two agitated men.
TV writer/producer goes back to his roots with emotionally raw TheaterWorks Hartford project
“Fever Dreams” is all about a love affair, but it keeps you guessing from the beginning to the end about who loves who most and why. The story is further complicated by having the two men in the love triangle be former college best buddies. Lieber’s most inspired concept is to have these characters be middle-aged. The affair has been going on for over a decade. Lives have changed. Dreams have died.
It’s the kind of show that’s filled with danger elements, props that don’t always get into shows because they can be tricky for actors to consistently control: power tools, a fire poker, a kitchen knife, a handgun. Waving these things around is a cool theatrical extension of how emotional they’re getting.
The basic plot is that Zachary is seeing Adele, Adele is married to Miller and Miller isn’t as laid-back and oblivious as he seems. The whole play takes place in a remote cabin, the sort you’d use for a vacation retreat except that in this play nobody can escape from anything, especially not the choices they made decades ago.
The plot twists and surprises are frequent and, if you don’t get into the spirit of the piece, it may feel over the top or ridiculous. “Fever Dreams” seeks to harness and ride a massive wave of energy for two hours (including intermission). If the characters aren’t fighting and bleeding, they’re unloading one life-changing revelation after another.
Zachary starts out “Fever Dreams” seeming as if he’s the dominant one but turns out to be the most shell-shocked emotionally. Doug Savant, a former teen heartthrob (“Melrose Place”) and nighttime soap stalwart (“Desperate Housewives”), plays Zachary with a hangdog expression but still comes off as strong and attractive enough to make his romance with Adele believable.
Adele seems out of control when we first see her brandishing a firearm, but she turns out to be completely in control. Lana Young plays her as if she feels she’s several steps ahead of Zach and Miller at all times. Some of it, we find out, is a self-protective bluff.
Tim DeKay, a star of the TV crime series “White Collar,” is Miller, the last character to arrive in the play and the wildest card when he does. He brings a looseness and unpredictability to the story just when it is most needed. DeKay can be funny and affable even when he’s screaming in pain.
This is only “Fever Dreams”’ second full production following a world premiere at the Contemporary American Theatre Festival in West Virginia last year. It is ideally suited for TheaterWorks, which has specialized in dramas that revolve around deep conversations and angry flare-ups.
Director Rob Ruggiero tends to do well with plays set in cabins. In the past at TheaterWorks, he’s done Laura Eason’s “Sex With Strangers” and Jez Butterworth’s “The River.” Ruggiero is good at working with small casts in close quarters while keeping the action clean and easy to follow. The set, designed by Luke Cantarella, is detailed and realistically cluttered. Having a bedroom visible on the left side of the stage is a nice touch, though it’s not used all that much, it’s a constant reminder of what brought these people to the cabin.
There’s a lot that’s obvious and inevitable about “Fever Dreams (of Animals on the Verge of Extinction).” The old “Chekhov’s gun” principle (if a gun is shown in the first act, expect it to be fired in the second) is on full display. But Lieber clearly enjoys building up expectations only to raise or dash them. What’s remarkable is that he’s setting off these emotional explosions in the context of true love, longterm relationships, music, family and science.
“Fever Dreams” is filled with metaphors and allegories that come from ecology, entomology and psychology. Every big theatrical move is underscored by a subtle anthropological or sociological insight.
High emotions, physical acting and thoughtful conversations conducted at this level can get wearying. “Fever Dreams” has to boil, simmer, boil, simmer for a long time in and just keeps ratcheting up the shock announcements and threats of injury. It may or may not be to your taste (the fact that we’re now in the dark gloomy Halloween season helps), but it stays true to its own excitable values.
“Fever Dreams (of Animals on the Verge of Extinction)” by Jeffrey Lieber, directed by Rob Ruggiero, runs through Nov. 3 at TheaterWorks Hartford, 233 Pearl St., Hartford. Performances are Tuesdays through Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 2:30 and 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2:30 p.m. $33-$78. twhartford.org .
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