As with Yasmina Reza's Art - in which there are three "takes" by three male friends on the extravagant purchase of an abstract artwork - her new piece re-plays the same awkward scene three times. Important guests arrive an evening too soon: not exactly a new idea in drama. And it requires an immense Suspension of Disbelief to equate the suppressed hysteria of John Turturro with the behavior of an insecure and very minor French Astrophysicist.
Nonetheless, Helen Hunt is beautiful as his wife. Linda Edmond is almost heart-breaking as the humiliated wife of the Chief Honcho French Astrophysicist. But the couples don't have to be French: this is a generic play.