Theatre in Review: How Is It That We Live or Shakey Jake + Alice (The Tent/ART New York Theatres)How Is It That We Live... (full title above) is a play at odds with itself. It is ostensibly about the lifelong relationship of the title characters. But the playwright, Len Jenkin, has trouble keeping his mind on that subject. And if he can't do it... When we first encounter Jake and Alice, they are teenagers, probably in the 1960s, although we are urged not to worry about time frames too much. He is a so-called bad boy -- suspended from school, with an arrest on his record -- but with a father dying of emphysema, yet still sneaking cigarettes, his sorrow and anger are easy to understand. Alice comes "from a long line of losers" not least of which is the uncle in jail for manslaughter. But their futures are looking starkly different. Jake is tightly coiled, ready to explode, vowing to run off post-graduation and take up Buddhism. Alice is self-possessed, purposeful, and Harvard-bound. Clearly, the clock is ticking on their relationship and neither knows what to do about it. Little light is shed when Alice first notes, "You mix me up and make me crazy, make me forget everyone else, everything else, but you don't make me happy, Jakey," followed by "You don't get it yet, do you, Jakey? I'm your girl. Now and forever. I'm your girl." Is it one or the other or both? Is this a stalemate? These questions are postponed until 15 years later. We meet a sadder but wiser Alice who, in a lengthy monologue, details the many mistakes and wasted opportunities that have left her divorced, raising a child, and just getting by. (Kate Arrington plays Alice, and her thoughtful handling of this passage is quite the nicest thing in the show.) Jake has taken on plenty of mileage, too, including a lineup of subsistence jobs, a stint with the Army in Honduras, a relationship with an ER nurse, and oceans of booze. During this time, he sent exactly one letter to Alice. He insists that he never forgot her, but she doesn't believe him. And, frankly, why should we? But the question of what caused this long, long silence, is tabled -- largely, I think, because Jenkin has no interest in it. Instead, he prefers to keep deploying Clarence -- an ex-doorman who sometimes is missing a leg while (implausibly) wielding a single crutch and sometimes physically intact -- and a woman, alternately known as Sweet Lucy or Snake Hips, who is a theatre major and, apparently, the angel of death. Both characters, who inexplicably know plenty about Jake and Alice, take up inordinate amounts of stage time with lengthy speeches about shark attacks, exploding gentlemen's clubs, and children's cancer hospitals going up in flames. I don't understand their role, but they certainly leave one feeling that Jake and Alice's problems don't amount to a hill of beans in this world. Jason Bowen and Delfin Gokhan Meehan, who play these interlopers, are the soul of professionalism. But they have been sent on a fool's errand. They also act as narrators, which, for example, means that Bown must say, "Alice drinks some more wine" just as Arrington, you know, drinks some more wine. This is my least favorite thing in the theatre. Aimee Hayes, who directed, has supplied the production with superior talents. Arrington and Fred Weller do their level best to gin up some chemistry between Alice and Jake; Weller also does a solid job of aging from impetuous adolescence to just this side of the grave. Scenic designer Alexander Woodward has stretched an enormous tree branch over the stage, decorating the ceiling with attractive colored lights, and sound designer John Kilgore has supplied a lovely playlist of period hits from Sam Cooke and Bo Diddley. (Anybody who includes "Cry Me a River" by Julie London is all right with me.) Clare Lippincott's costumes and Mary Louise Geiger's lighting are solid. But How Is It That We Live... is a vehicle without a motor, a clunker compared to Jake's 1955 Cadillac Coup de Ville. I can't get past the feeling that Jenkin has concocted this situation largely as a staging ground for lyrical writing. This he supplies in vast quantities, sadly to diminishing effect. --David Barbour. 
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