Heidi Schreck’s GRAND CONCOURSE (playing @ SpeakEasy Stage
through April 1st) makes you think of Grand Central Station but it’s
actually a soup kitchen where lost souls in transit can hear a kind word, enjoy
a hearty bowl of soup and move on—to
the next shelter or their next crisis. It’s also a mecca where some come to
find solace, even redemption through the act of volunteering.
The kitchen is run by a take charge nun (Melinda Lopez in a
solid performance) who is having a crisis of faith herself, wondering if one
bowl of sustenance can really make a difference to the needy people she serves.
Sometimes, to her surprise, a volunteer (Ally Dawson in an intense performance)
may need more help than the homeless.
Director Bridget Kathleen O’Leary’s lovely, lyrical
production is full of sweet humor, from the cheeky young caretaker/handyman (Alejandro
Simoes at his most charming) who isn’t sure he’s ready to marry his sweetheart
just yet—and from Thomas Derrah
in a tour de force as a delightful, down-on-his-luck, bi-polar regular who,
despite being forbidden to, sneaks in to the church at night to sleep in the
sanctuary.
These four characters collide, with extremely serious
consequences that, curiously, don’t develop dramatically until the very end of
the play, leaving us to wonder what will happen to these desperate people. We
can only guess… which makes the piece a series of painterly vignettes not
unlike Elmer Rice’s slice-of-life STREET SCENE.
Forgiveness is a theme, as is sacrifice, as is the church
itself, whose (metaphorical) cracked, damaged stained glass windows tower over
Jenna McFarland Lord’s spiffy, spacious kitchen. I left the play, reminded of
the fact that most downtown historical (Protestant) churches allow the homeless
to sleep in their outside entryways but not inside their buildings. (This is
because they’re afraid of the damage strangers might wreak on the plumbing and
religious artifacts they hold so dear. Really? Could they not employ a caretaker
to watch over a few beds in their basements?)
I left with other questions, too, about what forgiveness is,
for example: what it can and can’t do. Schreck sure knows how to get an
audience thinking.
