Here the pair are working-class New Yorkers with complementary emotional wounds, he bursting with passions he has no tools except violence for expressing, she aching with loneliness and need, both of them convinced they are undeserving of even an ordinary degree of contentment in life. In the reverse formula of the genre, they go to bed first and discover they're in love after, and the power of the play lies in our hope that they will fight the habits of a lifetime and overcome their fear of happiness.To have Italian-Americans played by a German-Croatian and a Hungarian-Romanian almost sounds like a joke, but Alessija Lause and Nikolaus Szentmiklosi not only master the sound and rhythms of American speech but capture and convey the tragicomic insecurities and yearnings of the two characters, he conveying a vulnerability even in moments of belligerence while she lets us see that the woman's hard front is actually brittle and fragile.Together with Andreas Schmidt's sensitive and perfectly paced direction, they deliver all the sweetness of Shanley's surprisingly delicate romantic fable.
Review by Gerald Berkowitz for "The Stage"
