For those of you unfamiliar with Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington D.C., be familiar! I may be a bit biased in my love for the theatre as I once interned in the Development department, but they really do produce amazing shows that challenge the audience and stretch perceptions of what theatre is and what it can be. I was lucky enough to attend a performance of the recently extended “Gruesome Playground Injuries” by Rajiv Joseph (Pulitzer nominated playwright for “Bengal Tiger”). The play follows two people in a somewhat nonlinear journey of unrequited love and loss and ultimately speaks to the power of senseless devotion.

The Woolly stage transformed into a theatre-in-the-round space for the performance, integral to the scene changes and story telling aspect of the play. It’s easy for “in the round” performances spaces to ruin a show, but this was certainly not the case in this production. Just as the audience is privy to a more complete viewing perspective, so are they ushered into a broad spectrum of time as the play spans from the character’s at age eight into their late 30s. Doug (Tim Getman) and Kayleen (Gabriela Fernandez-Coffey) are the only two characters in the play, but this doesn’t prevent Joseph from developing characters off stage (most notably Kayleen’s emotionally disdaining parents and Doug’s ‘perfect’ family). Fernandez-Coffey plays an excellent fiery stoic, letting Doug in just enough to make it clear why he is so taken with her while stubbornly shutting him out. Getman plays crazy and steadfast marvelously, maintaining his childish curiosity but over time developing his sense of care for Kayleen.

“Gruesome” is in line with the theme of the 09-10 Woolly season, which questions the idea that theatre is about story telling. In his program note, Woolly Artistic Director Howard Shalwitz states that theatre is about “vicarious experience…the chance to experience life from inside the skin of other people.” At first, this might seem a little crazy because without a story theatre becomes relegated to a pigeonholed category mirroring Beckett, right? Well, not really. Books provide lengthy and in-depth development of characters and setting, attached to the framework of a story. Movies provide specific detail and jump around from scene to scene, and often movies simply follow a story without deeper perspective on character or human experience. Theatre gives the perfect amount of insight, and truly shows what other people experience. As a theatergoer and a person who wishes to work with/in theatre, Shalwitz’ claim resonates with me because it gives meaning to theatre. I want to witness things that make me question my motives and existence on this earth (not necessarily in an existential crisis sort of way, but in a more introspective vein). While it is possible to experience this through the more parable-like structures of many movies or books, what better way to examine ones self than to examine the experience of another human being?

At any rate, “Gruesome” takes one inside the lives of a girl scarred emotionally and a boy scarred physically to create an amalgam of unfulfilled longing, pain and the unknown. It is a well written play, and Woolly’s production is well worth seeing. This review is a week late, but there are still three days to catch it before it closes on June 19th!