“The Eskimos have fifty words for snow. I wish there were fifty words to describe love,” says Jan, the distressed wife in Michael Weller’s two-hander, Fifty Words, now running at The Lounge Theater in Hollywood, directed by Shane Stevens. It’s an apt remark, as Jan (Olga Konstantulakis) and her husband Adam (Eric Larson), experience just about every kind of emotion imaginable during a long night of confrontation in their Brooklyn brownstone, circa 2008. The play could easily have been called “Long Night’s Journey Into Day.” Konstantulakis and Larson (who also co-produced the play) turn in splendid performances as an unlikely couple trying to come to grips with their failing marriage. That they have an (unseen) eight-year-old boy, Greg, further complicates things; she never wanted a kid but a kid they do have and that’s a reason to stay together—along with a whole slew of other reasons, which include moments of genuine respect, affection and desire for each other. It’s all shades of grey with these two: one minute they’re sipping champagne and engaging in foreplay, the next they’re spitting curses and even throwing things (Jan, anyway). They run a long emotional gambit as the hours tick away: arguing, accusing, reminiscing, snarling, weeping, apologizing, confessing., etc. Those fifty words again. Weller’s drama goes deep into the psyches of Jan and Adam, who met in an elevator and had sex in a taxicab a few hours later. It was a daring thing for that icy, conservative, Midwest gal to do, especially with a guy who really wasn’t her type (he was a street-smart, horny New Yorker—and probably Jewish, though that’s never mentioned). But she liked the strong, bold way he came on to her and forced her to break out of her shell. Now, though, she has slipped back in that shell and no longer finds him strong and bold. In fact, she more than once calls him a goof-bag and an asshole. Professionally they are under great strain: his architectural career is in trouble and she’s trying to launch a start-up business. The long hours she puts in at the computer are taking their toll (that’s on top of being a mother and a home-maker). It doesn’t help either that Adam’s work involves a lot of travel, especially to the Midwest…where, we learn, round about midnight, that he’s having an affair with a married woman. Who stupidly, or maybe spitefully, calls him at home. The resulting blow-up is loud, profane and violent, but such is Weller’s skill as a writer that he makes you think Jan and Adam might still eventually save their marriage…until the next psychological layer is peeled back and something new and troubling is revealed about these two ill-starred lovers. Konstantulakis and Larson can not be commended enough for their acting work. Aided by Shane Stevens’ sensitive and skilled direction, they command the stage and hold us in their magical spell from beginning to end.
