Phillyist Reviews... Grace, or the Art of Climbing

If anybody but Nice People Theatre Company told me that they were doing a show that would be, at least in part, about rock climbing, I'd be a little skeptical. But because I've never had a bad experience with Nice People, I was willing to go with the flow, sit on the floor, and watch an activity that never especially interested me.

Holy shit, am I interested now.

Grace, written by Lauren Feldman, isn't just about rock climbing. It's about fathers and daughters, boyfriends and girlfriends, teachers and students. It's about running away from yourself to find yourself. It's is a beautifully-staged, moving play that focuses more on relationships and emotions than the physicality of rock climbing—in fact, the physicality becomes the way to channel and focus on these things, rather than to distract from them. Director Pirronne Yousefzadeh deserves credit for not taking the easy way out: it would have been so easy to let the actors sleep-walk between the climbing scenes (all staged in a remarkably low-ceilinged basement that works courtesy of clever rigging by technical director Stephen Hungerford), but instead she focuses on the poignancy of the script and lets the climbing scenes supplement. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't moved to sniffles more than once.

Which isn't to say that Grace isn't terribly funny. Although two of the central relationships in the show—between the protagonist, Em (Rachael Joffred), and her father (Bob Weick), and between Em and her ex-boyfriend, Sam (Dan Hodge)—are unhappy ones, ample comic relief is sprinkled through the show. Ensemble cast members Dan Hodge, Kevin Meehan, Bi Jean Ngo, and Mary Tuomanen are all positively charming as the "kids" in a rock climbing club, and charming as the adult characters they also portray. (Ngo's "adult" character, Dell, is especially entertaining, and Ngo herself moves well in front of the audience and doesn't pander to them for laughs.) These actors complement lead Joffred's Em as she climbs, soliloquizes, loves, loses. Joffred, whose work I'd previously admired in NPTC's Psalms of a Questionable Nature delivers a stellar performance. She's captivating on her own, and in dialogue (comedic with Armando Batista, playing her climbing instructor; tragic with Weick as father—both excellent actors in their own right) she shares the stage without turning down her shine. This, ladies and gentlemen, is an actress to watch.

Unfortunately, Nice People ran into a bit of bad luck with its schedule—Grace is competing with the Phillies in the World Series. But the show is short enough, at an hour and forty minutes long, to let you out in time to see at least the second half of a game. As bonus incentive, tickets to tomorrow's show (which also competes with Halloween merriment) are only $5 if you enter "Pick Us" as a discount code when purchasing your tickets online. Trust me, it will be worth the investment.