Theatre in Review: Harbor (Primary Stages)

	Randy Harrison. Photo Carol Rosegg

Robert Frost's observation that "home is the place where, when you go there, they have to take you in" is put to the acid test in Harbor. Playwright Chad Beguelin plots a fractious family reunion, throwing together two wildly disparate siblings and their loved ones and letting everyone get on everyone else's nerves.

"They hyphenated their names," says Donna, contemptuously, referring to her brother, Kevin, and his husband, Ted. (Having obtained a legal marriage license in the state of New York, they are now the Adams-Wellers.) Kevin and Ted, together for ten years, live in upper-middle-class splendor in Sag Harbor. Ted is a successful architect, although, post-2008, business is on the thin side; Kevin is a writer, with only a cartoon caption in The New Yorker and an unfinished novel to show for his efforts. (When we first meet him, he is laboring over brochure copy for the local chamber of commerce.) The last thing either is expecting is a drop-in visit from Donna, a rolling calamity of a relative who has been out of their loop for years.

"Oh God, you're not calling me from jail, are you?" asks Kevin. It's a plausible fear: A poster child for bad life choices, the jobless and homeless Donna arrives with her 15-year-old daughter, Lottie, in tow. Lottie, clearly the adult in the relationship, is reading The House of Mirth; when Donna asks what the book is about, Lottie replies, rather pointedly, that it focuses on a drug-addicted woman who lets any chance for a good marriage slip through her fingers. That's the end of that conversation.

Despite Donna's obvious disdain for Kevin and Ted's well-heeled alliance -- "In my book," she says, "all relationships are two-person cults." -- she throws a pair of curveballs at her hosts. First of all, she announces she is pregnant. (Kevin's initial reaction is to get the martini out of her hand.) Second, she thinks Kevin and Ted should raise the baby -- despite the fact that Ted, under the influence of too many cocktails, has expressed his utter loathing of the parental state. (Or, as he puts it, "Just because you decided to spread your legs like a five-cent whore one night," doesn't make a person worthy of special consideration.) However, Kevin, against his better judgment, finds himself surprisingly interested in Donna's proposition.

From this point on, all relations -- marital, sibling, and filial -- head south, as Donna's proposal drives a wedge between Kevin and Ted and also alienates Lottie. ("Where are you going?" asks Donna. "To get you a wire hanger!" snaps Lottie.) The script neatly pairs off the emotional adults (Ted and Lottie) against those with maturity issues (Donna and Kevin), but the ensuing emotional chaos isn't nearly as entertaining as it might be, largely because of Beguelin's uncertain handling of his material. Most of the first act is played for laughs that are strictly formulaic. Ted, describing the chaos children bring to a marriage, says, "The verbal abuse makes Angela's Ashes seem like a musical comedy." Donna tells Kevin, "You make Charles Nelson Reilly sound like the Marlboro Man." To make sure we know that Donna is a vulgarian, she says, "I always thought a misogynist was someone who gives massages." Even Lottie starts behaving like a sitcom showrunner; commenting on the parade of losers who have occupied Donna's bed, she snaps, "I've seen so many assholes, I could be a proctologist!"

Donna is as irritating to the audience as she is to Kevin and Ted, especially when making denigrating remarks that are supposed to be shockingly funny but are merely grating. "Don't be such a bottom," she complains to Kevin. Later, she tells him, "There is a woman in your relationship, and it's you." Kevin never challenges such comments; when she says, "You want to be a mommy," he simply agrees.

There's a fairly notable change in tone in Act II; the jokes fade away as major decisions must be made, ugly truths are aired, and both emotional blackmail and cash payments are put into play. At this point, Harbor becomes rather more interesting, but Beguelin never makes these people and their problems matter. There are also nagging plausibility issues: Has Kevin really flailed away at that novel for ten years without his lack of a career becoming an issue? How is it that Lottie, who lives in stifling intimacy with Donna, doesn't know her mother is pregnant? Clichés abound. Ted is the stereotypical fussy gay, house-proud and interested only in entertaining himself. Lottie tracks down her birth father on the phone, and, in a monologue that one could have predicted 90 minutes earlier, discovers that he has no interest in her.

Mark Lamos directs these mixed-up proceedings with a surprisingly sure hand, keeping the tempo brisk and making sure that each member of the four-person cast makes the most of his or her slim opportunities. Still, Randy Harrison and Paul Anthony Stewart, both attractive and skillful actors, struggle to make something plausible out of Kevin and Ted's relationship. Erin Cummings can't make Donna more likeable, but she is touching near the end, when she reveals the unhappy woman behind the abrasive remarks. Alexis Molnar makes the best impression of all as Lottie, whether she is telling her mother that she is grounded or kvelling over the first real birthday cake in her life.

Lamos is always a director with an eye for design, and he makes sure Harbor looks and sounds terrific. Andrew Jackness' clever set design surrounds a minimal arrangement of elegant furniture with walls bearing images of posh Hamptons homes. It's a neat way of suggesting Ted and Kevin's well-off circumstances without crowding the stage; it also allows for rapid scene changes. Japhy Weideman's lighting is equally tasteful, creating a variety of looks (different times of day, interiors vs. exteriors) without making a big show of it. Candice Donnelly's costumes effortlessly denote the characters' class differences; there is a particularly amusing moment when we discover that Lottie sleeps in an oversized Hooters T-shirt. John Gromada's sound design blends a variety of effects (seagulls, passing cars, telephones) with some nifty jazz selections and his own original music.

By the final curtain, everyone's domestic arrangements have been reshuffled, and yet somehow nothing important seems to have happened. The characters in Harbor are full of talk, and their problems couldn't be more up to date. But as far as dramatic family reunions go, this one is pretty minor. -- David Barbour