Natural Affection
Natural Affection
The New Yorker
In the early sixties, Bernie Slovenk (Alec Beard), a frustrated car salesman, is not at all happy when Donnie (Chris Bert), the seventeen-year-old son of his girlfriend, Sue (Kathryn Erbe), arrives at their one-bedroom apartment in Chicago for the holidays. It’s not only that the boy, who spent his early life in an orphanage and the last three years at reform school, is difficult; it’s also that Bernie is a resentful, jealous brute who doesn’t want to share his home or his girl with anyone. Donnie and Bernie are both ticking time bombs, and Sue, confused about her allegiances, is unable to defuse them. William Inge’s deep and dark old-school drama from 1963, produced by TACT, might have felt stilted under the direction of Jenn Thompson, were it not for the brilliant comic relief from John Pankow, who plays Vince, Bernie and Sue’s closeted, alcoholic neighbor, with abandon.
Previews begin September 17, opens September 26, closes October 26
BECKETT THEATRE
410 W. 42nd St., New York, N.Y.
212-239-6200
theatrerow.org
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