Blackbird, a Renaissance Theaterworks production, is a tale of forbidden love and human frailty. It is brilliantly scripted by playwright David Harrower and directed by Suzan Fete. The play's only two characters, a man and a woman, unexpectedly meet 15 years after their affair. The woman, only 12 at the time of their sexual encounter, is now a seemingly full-fledged adult. The much-older man, who served a several-year prison sentence for sexual abuse, started life over. He changed his name, moved to another town, got a job and a new girlfriend (this time one his own age).
Their meeting takes place in a deliberately unromantic setting: the employee break room where the man works. It's the only place he can think of to bring the woman, who suddenly appears after hours. The break room is glaringly grungy. Food wrappers litter the floor. Fluorescent lighting shines down from cracked and water-soaked ceiling tiles. White plastic tables and chairs are smeared with grime. The playwright and set designer don't want to make the couple's reunion a pretty one.
Ray, the perpetrator, is completely unhinged when he first sees Una. It's almost as if a ghost had reappeared. "Are you allergic to me?," she asks, as he backs away from her. He fears that she will blow his cover. Una has many things to tell him. For one, she is enraged at his attempts to re-start his life. Since she was only 12, she didn't have the option of running away and starting over. She had to stay with her family and endure the taunts and stares of classmates, her parents and the neighbors. She tries to tell him how her life spun out of control, how her sense of identity was forever damaged by the incident. Ray listens, but he cannot fully comprehend her pain.
Eventually, the two begin to relax and the dialogue becomes more even. They now speak in complete sentences, and even reminisce about their former feelings for each other. Although the play has a good dose of humor, it never wavers from the reality of what transpired between them. They agree that Ray must take full responsibility for the episode, and he does. And yet, in its brief 70 minutes, the play also raises questions that cannot be answered so easily.
As Ray, Brian Mani gives a memorable performance of a man who fails to understand himself. He makes Ray into a sympathetic character a man who cannot even understand his desires much less explain them. Carrie Coon, who plays Una, has no such trouble grasping the enormity of what happened to her. This remarkable Chicago actor has the ability to shift between the immature thoughts and feelings of a 12-year-old and the stark reality of the adult she has become. There is remarkable chemistry between the two characters, though there is no apparent connection between the action onstage and the play's title, Blackbird.
