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Best to plan for stiff drinks, rather than posh dessert, after this one.

Monday Jul 24, 2006.     By Julia Steinberger

Theater Feed

"The Unmentionables" is a particularly apt name for Bruce Norris' latest work: While the characters in this play can't seem to stop talking, it is the issues they avoid that get closest to the truth.

Steppenwolf Theatre ends its 30th-anniversary celebration of new work with the fifth play by Norris to be realized on the company's stage. The production occurs at the one-year anniversary of Norris' "The Pain and the Itch," the controversial Jeff-Award winner overshadowed by a dramatized child abuse scandal involving youngsters in the cast. Viewers will unavoidably draw parallels between the two plays, as they have much in common, down to several characters that seem to be translated directly from one script to the next. But in "The Unmentionables," Norris refined an important element of his socially critical formula; here, ugly themes deal a far more personal blow.

Norris' caricatures, portrayed with precision by the ensemble cast, meet up in an unnamed African nation where they've come to "do good." For businessman Don (ensemble member Rick Snyder) and his chatty wife, Nancy (ensemble member Amy Morton), this means establishing a factory and "bringing jobs," along with environmental degradation, poor working conditions and an enforced change in lifestyle for the native population. For young idealist Dave (Lea Coco) and his fiancee, Jane (Shannon Cochran), this means bringing evangelism and education. Their foils are an educated African doctor (Ken E. Head), a corrupt politician (Ora Jones) and a teen criminal (Jon Hill).

The Americans are fond of explaining and excusing themselves. The African characters often speak their mind, though that doesn't necessarily make them more pleasant. We learn most about everyone, however, when their immediate safety is threatened and their empty talk exposed by their utter failure to act.

It is to Shapiro's and her cast's credit that we clearly see each characters' self-righteous denial as they tiptoe around every controversial topic. Norris' dialogue is masterful, propelling the story forward with suspense and biting wit, and the performances will have you howling.

And yet you're right to feel like maybe you'd like to leave. While it was easy last year to look at "Itch's" dysfunctional family and feel glad that I wasn't like them, it was much harder to convince myself this time that I would react any better than these pathetics if threatened in a foreign land.

To bring it home is the question that's asked at the beginning of the play: Why would we sit through this? Why would we choose to spend our leisure time listening to this arrogant artist pick our privileged lives to pieces and tell us we're worthless? Sit down in the theater ask yourself: If we're already so angry at ourselves, what will it take to make us change things?

Playing at Steppenwolf Theatre; 1650 N. Halsted; (312) 335-1650 or reserve tickets online at www.steppenwolf.org; $25-$40. Runs through Aug. 27; 7:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; 3:00 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday (August 13, 20 and 27 will have matinee performances only).