Them & Us
Written by Tracy Dawson
Directed by Ruth Madoc-Jones
Featuring Tracy Dawson, Sarah Dodd, Michael Healey & Gray Powell
Runs January 8-31 at Theatre Passe Muraille
By Daina Valiulis
While entertaining and cute, Theatre Passe Muraille’s Them & Us was also hit-and-miss.
A series of vignettes about loneliness and connecting, this play features four cast members playing multiple roles: Sarah Dodd and Gray Powell are fantastic in each and every one — Dodd juxtaposing uncertainty and honesty, Powell pulling off both clumsy and suave. Unfortunately, Second City-trained playwright and actress Tracy Dawson was the weakest link: her acting was inconsistent and seemed put on. Michael Healey, though charming and undoubtedly talented, was one-note.
Dawson reveals that she wrote Them & Us while she briefly lived in New York, wondering “how many people like me were eating dinner in their apartments alone, all of us yearning for one another and not even knowing it.” While true, the play doesn’t paint quite as universal a picture as she may hope. No same-sex relationships were represented, for instance. Regardless of their sexuality, all couples deal with the same issues faced in this production.
The scenes are connected only by their theme and are interchangeable, never delving too deeply into the subject matter. Considering the vignette format, however, the overall piece was refreshing and fun — still managing to connect to its underlying heart.
A favourite scene has Dodd and Healey frankly discussing how their married lives will go — he tells her he will be a drunk, resentful of the things she can’t give and she, an angry housewife and bad mother who withholds love and affection out of spite. Andy McKim, Passe Muraille’s artistic director, says: “For some reason, it seems like it is getting harder to develop these relations, not easier. Why is that?” But we aren’t in trouble, Them & Us helps audiences realize. Relationships are not easy. They require cultivation — time and effort that people aren’t always willing to give. There are a million excuses for not connecting, but the opportunities are almost always present.
