Turning into Your Parents

I’m Gonna Pray for You So Hard – First Floor Theater

They say you are supposed to write about what you know. That’s probably why so many plays (and movies for that matter) are about writers and writing. If nothing else, writers know about that.

I’m Gonna Pray for You So Hard centers around aging playwright David and his actress/playwright daughter Ella. She is desperate for his approval both as a father and a fellow writer. Their relationship is… not good. Over a booze and drug fueled evening, a lifetime of resentments bubble to the surface and explode.

The show is presented in a 90-minute single act without an intermission, but covers in each half two different periods of time, several years apart. My problems with the show largely center on the first act. I don’t think, despite considerable talent on both their parts, that the actors connected in the first half of the show. Maybe it was the dialogue, maybe it was a directorial choice, but for the first half, they did not feel like a parent and child with the shared history that relationship suggests. The other problem is that the first half is fairly monotone in pacing and content, largely just David griping about how no other playwright is as good or honest as he is, his daughter included. By the second act, their connection feels more real, and both actors turn in great performances. Freed from the constraints of the earlier scene where she is largely only responding to her father’s rants, Amanda Caryl Fink as Ella shines. Tim Kidwell gives a performance as David with a physicality that was heartbreaking and amazing to watch.

The show name checks just about every writer who wrote a play in English since the Industrial Revolution. The problem is that invoking those other writers forces a comparison with them. I have no problem with the fact that children repeating the toxic patterns of their parents is a common plot. It’s pretty much the plot of every drama depicting a parent and child, but for good reason. What those other writers did was to leaven those stories so that even the unlikable characters remain at least interesting. Edward Albee packages his characters’ failings in acid wit. Tennessee Williams has such boozy affection for his characters that he and thus the audience can’t stay mad at them. Here, though, I think the author genuinely dislikes both characters. A lot. While I am not suggesting every character needs some secret redeeming quality, I do think there has to be something to latch onto to make you care enough to keep watching them.

As I said, the acting, especially in the second half, was very good. My problem remains that, by the end of the show, I was still not sufficiently invested in the story to care if Ella is turning into her father. The acting, while excellent, was not enough to overcome the mix of a first act that felt stuck in first gear and the constant reminder that I was in a Theater watching Theater about Theater.

Somewhat Recommended

Reviewed by Kevin Curran

Presented April 20-May 18 by First Floor Theater at the Den Theatre, 1331 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago.

Tickets are pay-what-you-can and available at the box office, by calling 773-697-3830 or by going to www.firstfloortheater.com.

Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.