Known for raising provocative questions and bringing to its stage the most unorthodox playwrights and directors, A.C.T. presented a Jane Anderson-written and directed play that kept viewers on edge of their seats for the duration of the show. “The Quality of Life” is mostly about life robbed and stripped of its quality, when a toothbrush becomes a much more valuable item than a tribal mask brought back from a scientific expedition, and an avocado tree planted in freezing Ohio is intended as a poor substitute for a lost child. The play consists mostly of dialogs, which are all arguments, because in this day and age there is no way to reconcile disparate views on the meaning of human existence, life and death, religion and free thought, love and obligation, freedom and responsibility. (And the definitively timeless play does not even touch upon politics!) The clash of characters and ideas is all happening within a family, pitting idealism against reality and bringing to the surface harbored emotions rarely displayed in normal circumstances. To make sure the boredom of normalcy is not creeping in and disturbing the beauty or the play’s rhetoric, the author employs a firestorm, a psycho killer, an incurable disease, and a bunch of coyotes to keep the high voltage of the on-stage action. A foursome of JoBeth Williams, Steven Culp, Dennis Boutsikaris, and Laurie Metcalf, with three original award-winning cast members, delivers every line of the play with a force and power of an electric current. Runs through Nov. 23 at A.C.T. Geary Theatre, 415 Geary Theatre, SF. More info at: www.act-sf.org. Photo by Kevin Berne. Dinah (JoBeth Williams) and Neil (Dennis Boutsikaris). To Die or Not to Die in ACT’s “The Quality of Life”
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Known for raising provocative questions and bringing to its stage the most unorthodox playwrights and directors, A.C.T. presented a Jane Anderson-written and directed play that kept viewers on edge of their seats for the duration of the show. “The Quality of Life” is mostly about life robbed and stripped of its quality, when a toothbrush becomes a much more valuable item than a tribal mask brought back from a scientific expedition, and an avocado tree planted in freezing Ohio is intended as a poor substitute for a lost child. The play consists mostly of dialogs, which are all arguments, because in this day and age there is no way to reconcile disparate views on the meaning of human existence, life and death, religion and free thought, love and obligation, freedom and responsibility. (And the definitively timeless play does not even touch upon politics!) The clash of characters and ideas is all happening within a family, pitting idealism against reality and bringing to the surface harbored emotions rarely displayed in normal circumstances. To make sure the boredom of normalcy is not creeping in and disturbing the beauty or the play’s rhetoric, the author employs a firestorm, a psycho killer, an incurable disease, and a bunch of coyotes to keep the high voltage of the on-stage action. A foursome of JoBeth Williams, Steven Culp, Dennis Boutsikaris, and Laurie Metcalf, with three original award-winning cast members, delivers every line of the play with a force and power of an electric current. Runs through Nov. 23 at A.C.T. Geary Theatre, 415 Geary Theatre, SF. More info at: www.act-sf.org. Photo by Kevin Berne. Dinah (JoBeth Williams) and Neil (Dennis Boutsikaris). 
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