A truly interesting and unique play by British playwright Zinnie Harris, Meet Me At Dawn is the kind of programming theaters should be scrambling to include in their seasons.
Raw, yet refined in its gorgeous writing, the story will suck one in and spit them out. It’s the first fully-staged production by Mercury Theater, the North Bay’s newest theater company. The show runs in Petaluma in the former Cinnabar Theater space through April 19.
What’s so effective is that one can easily imagine oneself in the place of our two characters, long-time couple Robyn and Helen (played with conviction by the unfussy and moving work of Amanda Vitiellio and Ilana Niernberger), who find themselves marooned on an island after a horrific boating accident.
What transpires next is a story of incredibly universal scope, yet wrenchingly intimate detail, replete with an agonizing dialogue that Vitiello delivers both as Robyn and a mysterious woman, that is as astonishingly performed as it is written. The story asks questions we never want to hear, and we wouldn’t know how to answer, in regards to love, grief and the space between life and death.
Vitiello and Niernberger both deliver very subdued, real performances, with believable chemistry. Vitiello has a desperate lilt in her voice that makes one want to hug her. Niernberger is fully immersed and doesn’t push; her grounded commitment must be acknowledged. Physically, both move as if through a heavy filter, or perhaps the weight of the soul experiencing something totally insane.
The set by Peter Parish is deceptively simple but nicely detailed, with a dreamlike scrim and beachy, dusky textures. The sound design and original music by Jared Emerson-Johnson are both eerie and haunting, with a sad nostalgic undertone. There’s an atmosphere of lost love and total uncertainty with which both our characters and we as the audience must nightmarishly grapple.
It would be nearly impossible to not be gut punched by this play, for it goes (in a strangely gentle way) straight for the jugular, with a bittersweet and surreal impact that’s unbearable. Upon shutting my car door after the show, I promptly burst into tears. It’s that affecting and devastating.
This is a very good play presented by a very good cast and crew.
Mercury Theater presents ‘Meet Me at Dawn’ through April 19 at 3333 Petaluma Blvd. N., Petaluma. Fri & Sat, 7:30pm; Sun, 2pm. $20-$35. 707.658.9019. mercurytheater.org.
