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"What a strange job it is to kiss strangers in front of people and make it look like you know each other. Or kiss someone you know in front of people and make it look like a stranger," says Kevin (Tristan Johnson), a young actor, in Sarah Ruhl's clever comedy "Stage Kiss," making its regional debut at Wasatch Theatre Company.
We know that what happens on the stage isn't real life no matter how much it resembles it, but sometimes it's difficult to determine exactly where one stops and the other begins.
That's the conceit at the heart of Ruhl's play, which uses theatrical conventions to make fun of their own artificiality but also has deeper things to say about love and marriage.
Two actors simply named She (April Fossen) and He (Daniel Beecher) are cast in a melodramatic play called "The Last Kiss" about a dying woman who is reunited with her long-lost first love, and it turns out that the two actors were also lovers 20 years earlier. As rehearsals continue, their relationship in the play invades their real lives, and they decide they have fallen in love again.
The second act pushes things delightfully further. Her husband (David Hanson) and daughter (Ali Kinkade) and his girlfriend (Brenda Hattingh) visit the two in his apartment; the husband, who says his wife "always falls in love with whoever she's in a play with," and the daughter, who pronounces that "marriage is like a tattoo; you leave it on," are portrayed by the actors who played the same roles in "The Last Kiss." Then — in one of the play's silliest moments — the two lovers and the husband and girlfriend break into song and dance to "One Enchanted Evening," changing partners in the process.
To make this theatrical confection even frothier, Ruhl throws in a dithery director named Adrian Schwalbach (Anne Cullimore Decker) who bustles around making disastrous choices — when she can make a choice — and fancies herself a playwright. Her play is called "I Loved You before I Killed You" — need I say more?
"Stage Kiss" turns into a series of mirrors where life and art reflect and refract each other in increasingly ingenious and droll ways.
Director Mark Fossen's stylized, slightly over-the-top direction keeps things moving briskly along so the audience never gets ahead of what's coming next. The ricocheting emotions of April Fossen's bewildered She are a deft contrast to Daniel Beecher's sardonic, world-weary but willing-to-be-proven-wrong He. Decker plays the director with a bemused air of absent-minded abandon. Hanson's husband is sensibly down-to-earth. Kinkade's outspoken daughter, Hattingh's chattery girlfriend, and Johnson's sweet, insecure Kevin offer solid support.
Kit Anderton's dual sets — barebones rehearsal space and detailed one-room apartment, Danny Dunn's subtly shifting lighting, and Linda Eyring's stylish costumes sharply differentiate the play's two worlds. Trayven Call contributes some snappy dance steps.
Ruhl knows theatrical life, and "Stage Kiss" captures that savvy sensibility and makes us laugh at its pretentions. To add another life vs. art layer to this production, director Fossen is actor Fossen's husband, and the two are good friends with Beecher. —
"Stage Kiss"
Playful performances and brisk direction make Sarah Ruhl's clever comedy about the intersection of theatrical life and art consistently entertaining.
When • Reviewed on April; 30; Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 8 p.m. through May 14 with 2 p.m. matinees on Saturday May 7 and May 14; special Mother's Day matinee at 2 p.m on May 8.
Where • Studio Theatre at the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center, 138 W. Broadway, Salt Lake City.
Tickets • $20; call 355-ARTS or visit https://artsaltlake.org for tickets and http://www.wasatchtheatre.org for more information. The show contains adult language and situations.
Running time • Two hours and 15 minutes (including an intermission)