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‘Affluenza’ at Jewish Theatre
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
THEATRE REVIEW. “Affluenza.” Jewish Theatre of the South. Through Oct. 2.
The Jewish Theatre of the South’s virtuoso comic ensemble tosses around the rhymed couplets of James Sherman’s farce about American materialism as if they were multicolored balls in an intricate game.
The story, about a group jockeying to inherit an older man’s wealth, updates Moliere’s themes of greed, culpability and self-deception in plays like “Tartuffe” and “The Misanthrope” to our feel-good, consume-now society. Sherman’s vital Americanese displays all of the lightness, gaiety and poetic skill of the French satirist’s classic French.
Establishing herself as one of Atlanta’s best young comic actresses, Megan Hayes portrays the manipulative gold-digger Dawn with vitality and verbal dexterity. And David Marshall Silverman’s Jerome exudes the grandiose ego and Internet-numbed inertia of many young American men.
The action takes place in a Chicago penthouse, and allusions to the Windy City’s hustling, boisterous personality energize the rhythmic language. As the conflict between the higher and lower instincts of human nature unfolds, you can almost see Chicago’s exuberant chronicler Saul Bellow standing in the corner wearing a lascivious grin and a cocked fedora, a trench coat tossed over one shoulder.
Another presence inhabits the comedy. “Affluenza” begins with a jazzy version of Cole Porter’s “Love for Sale,” and the world-weary master would have loved Sherman’s wit and jaded outlook, transformed finally by human kindness.
THE 411: 8 p.m. Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays; 3 p.m. Sundays. Through Oct. 2. $18-$28. Jewish Theatre of the South, Marcus Jewish Community Center, 5342 Tilly Mill Road, Dunwoody. 770-395-2654. www.jplay.org.
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