Preview Thoughts on I Was Most Alive With You

As always, I will preface this post with the caveat that I already love and admire Craig Lucas and his work.  It colors everything I see that he writes and I freely admit it.  His work deeply touches something in me and I revel in that connection each time I see one of his plays.  Of course when Playwrights Horizons announced they would be doing Craig's new play, I Was Most Alive With You, I knew I would be seeing it.  Probably more than once.  Since Playwrights Horizons is presenting other writers I admire, I went ahead and bought a cheapie subscription to make sure I could get in.  I attended a preview performance last week - since the show isn't officially open yet and Craig was there taking notes, I'll only offer a few thoughts.  They will probably be scattered and confusing, for which I apologize in advance.

I Was Most Alive With You was presented at Huntington Theatre Company in 2016 - I was very fortunate to get a look at that version of the script and I found it mesmerizing.  It was so disappointing to me that I couldn't get to Boston to see the production.  After seeing it last week, it seems that Craig has done some work on the script - after the play was over, I thought, 'I'm not sure X was in the script I read,' or 'I don't remember Y happening that way before,' which suggested that the play really has resonance for me, even more than I had originally thought.  On the Playwrights Horizons website there is a description of the play: "Ash has a blessed life, thankful every day for the gifts of his family, his addiction, and his son’s Deafness. But on one fateful day, everything’s taken from him. How can he see this unexpected test, that threatens to cast him and his loved ones into darkness, as the ultimate gift? Performed simultaneously in English and ASL by two casts, Craig Lucas’s sublime, stunning new play is a theatrical event not to be missed."

photo credit: Joan Marcus

I agree.  I found I Was Most Alive With You to be incredibly powerful and a devastatingly emotional experience.  There was a talkback after the performance and you all know how I love a talkback.  Well, I didn't stay.  I didn't want to talk about my experience of seeing the play and I didn't want to hear anyone else talk about it, either.  I just wanted it to be in my head, to swirl around and make itself known to me.  As it swirled around, I think I found myself getting a little closer to what it is in Craig's work that is so moving to me, which is a bit scary.  To have such a connection with a writer's work is a complicated emotion - to feel so exposed and seen by someone who doesn't even really know you is very unsettling.  But that's what makes great writing great, I guess.  Even when it has nothing really to do with your life, it has EVERYTHING to do with you as a human.  Craig has once again found that in this piece.

A sort of riff on the Book of Job, I Was Most Alive With You takes place is shifting times, with the past reflecting on the present and vice versa.  A Deaf man, who is also gay and a recovering addict, has found a place of peace and acceptance in his life, but after he falls in love, things start to shift in unsettling ways.  His father had also found a place of peace, but his life is shattered as well.  Nearly every character in the play is dealing with some sort of recovery or hardship that they're looking to see past, but it never feels as if the situations are randomly thrown in.  Each character and each relationship reflects on the other and we see a family that is truly together yet truly separate.  All throughout the play, I was wondering exactly who the Job character would be, which I found interesting.  In looking at reviews of the previous production, different reviewers landed on different characters.  Which means that Craig is presenting something that truly asks the audience to lean in and participate.  At least for me, even though terrible things happen to the characters, their responses shine new lights on acceptance and survival and I found so many things to identify with.

photo credit: Joan Marcus

The acting is simply sublime (hello, Lois Smith! Lisa Emery! Russell Harvard!  OK, everyone!) and the use of 'shadow' actors performing the play simultaneously in ASL is fantastic.  The beauty and agony of the signing was so different from the beauty and agony of the dialogue from the hearing actors - I don't know how to do it justice in my description.  There were so many layers to it, it was gorgeous.  There's a scene in this play that's as beautiful and as devastating as any I've ever been wrecked by, and its incredible impact was magnified by the use of ASL. Director Tyne Rafaeli and Director of Artistic Sign Language Sabrina Dennison are rock stars, in my opinion.  Everyone should definitely go see this play - a new Craig Lucas play is always worth celebrating; a work that is truly inclusive is worth celebrating; and this is a story/production that is unlike any I've seen before.  I'm already planning a return trip to I Was Most Alive With You - maybe I'll see you there!