SOMEWHAT THREADY 'STITCHING'
By FRANK SCHECK
Rating: 
Last updated: 7:44 am
July 1, 2008
Posted: 3:41 am
July 1, 2008
'ALL of our problems come down to communication," declares Stu (Gian Murray Gianino) in "Stitching," Anthony Neilson's play about a couple coping with an unplanned pregnancy.
Well, yes and no. Stu and his girlfriend, Abby (Meital Dohan), certainly have trouble communicating - despite their efforts to bridge them by using "The Big Book of Personality Tests."
And while there's no shortage of sexual chemistry between them - it's hard to imagine anyone not having chemistry with the sultry Israeli actress Dohan, who played the sex-loving yeshiva administrative director on TV's "Weeds" - their issues go far beyond Stu's fear of commitment.
"Are you all that stands between me and the grave?" he wonders.
The play depicts the couple's emotional collisions in a series of short, pungent scenes, alternating between the present day and what are either flashbacks or fantasy role-play sequences depicting the beginnings of their relationship, when she was a novice, college-girl hooker and he an instructive client.
While the play taps into the issues that bedevil many couples, its impact is undercut by an unnecessary tendency toward shock value - never more so than in the play's final moments, alluded to in the title, which seem more appropriate for a horror film.
Also unfortunate is director Timothy Haskell's use of endless, pace-dragging interludes in which the actors change clothes between scenes.
Still, despite its flaws, the play lingers in the mind, thanks to the emotional acuity of the writing and the deeply committed performances by its actors.
