In The Nether, a futuristic net-based place so titled, virtual reality accessed via technology leads into a “Highway” open to self-identified users. The entrance under control of questionable Sims, whose clients he draws into a tech world of pornography and pedophilia. Detective Morris is convinced that their enjoyment might encourage such violence and even murder in the real world. She keeps interrogating Sims and even sends an investigator, Woodnut, to report on how it works. As a part of FST’s Stage III series of hard-hitting plays, this one has basic production elements. It’s far from the detailed realistic production I saw a few years ago in Philadelphia with contrasting dark, spare interrogation room and full-of-light Victorian, windowed Highway mansion with luscious garden. Still, suggestive projections at Bowne’s Lab together with Victorian props (like a Victrola) and costumes (especially the girl Iris’s frilly white dress and two of the men’s patterned suits) do the job. Director Jason Cannon wisely keeps all the actors always concentrated on each other, not the audience, even when facing us. We observe the interactions as if on a huge smart phone film. We hear Sims argue that no one is really getting physically hurt in his part of The Nether: It has rules against too great emotional involvement and children who are done away with get regenerated. But having observed effective William Thomas Evans’s Sims, known as Papa indulging himself with Iris, we fear when she (Leah Greene moving from playful and flirty to sensitive) asks for a birthday party. I wonder why Morris’ investigator is named Woodnut, since it suggests nothing Eric Gilde does, even as he yields to the pull of pleasure at The Highway with a casually sexy Iris. Gilde illustrates the dangers of being a client and in several episodes not just an investigator there. It’s surprising that Anique Clements’s smart Morris easily lets him return, even though she can use his reports against Sims. And as for reports, she herself doesn’t professionally concern herself with them. FST staff actor Sam Mossier proves his acting chops as Doyle, a math and science teacher who’s gone over the line between seeking an alternate way of life and—as a “Shade”—an alternate life itself. Because he never appears Victorian, he may be a real Avatar of misuse of technology today and possibly the future. I’ve heard that The Nether is “a think piece.” But what is there to think morally about arguments for use of the net and virtual reality that Sims gives? He is a psychopath, a sociopath, a pedophile, and a murderer. All negatives that negate The Good. Traditionally, even in the Victorian age and ours, they’re Evil to be avoided.
