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Yes, for those of you unfamiliar with Cloud Nine, "eras" is the right way to put it. The first act considers a colonial British family living in Africa sometime during the Victorian era; Act II investigates what happens to all the same people in London 25 years later, albeit in the late 1970s. And the troubles of those we meet early on are paralleled by those of those who come later, who are played by the same set of actors all shuffled around with little regard to such trivial matters as whether they're "straight" or "gay" or "male" or "female." Anything and everything is up for grabs. (The script dictates some of the madness, but leaves the specifics of who plays whom to the director and cast.) In this production, which has been directed by James Macdonald, the doublings are tightly, effectively conceived. Clarke Thorell starts off as the staunchly traditionalist patriarch Clive, who becomes a gabby, bratty little girl who wants everything immediately (hardly a stretch given Clive's own insatiable sexual proclivities). Chris Perfetti plays Clive's wife, Betty, in Act I, chafing against her maternal role and struggles to balance feelings for one paramour she wants and another she doesn't; in the second act he plays Betty's now-grown son, Edward, but faces a similar set of choices. Before intermission, Brooke Bloom plays Clive and Betty's doll-loving son, Edward, but afterward she's graduated to an elderly Betty who's capable of observing her past from a clearer perspective. Lucy Owen, who plays both Betty's mother, Maud, and the grown-up daughter of the family, Victoria (a literal, inanimate doll in Act I), similarly skirts generational barriers.
That is not to say it works perfectly. Macdonald and his cast haven't yet unlocked the same playful verve in Act II that they have in Act I, leaving the last hour of the two-and-a-half-hour evening feeling drearier and less specific than it should. We should get from the transformations and their ultimate destinations a catharsis that doesn't quite materialize here. There's an uneasy sense of this being two different (if related) plays performed sequentially rather than a single continuous thought; and things are not helped by the set design (by Dave Laffrey), which has renovated the Linda Gross Theater into a stadium playing space lined with (uncomfortable) wooden bleachers, failing to match either half convincingly. But Act I, when the conceit is at its newest and the actors most on their toes, is a raucous good time that fuses the serious plights of these at-sea people with scintillating comedy that hits all the right marks and targets. Thorell, Perfetti, and Bloom are particularly good here, fully embodying not just the roles their characters are supposed to play, but the toll those lies takes on their mental well-being. (The depth to which this plays out after the act break is one of this production's other strengths.) John Sanders and Izzie Steele are solid as two interloping lovers who become embroiled in the zaniness, but Owen's cool approach is more appropriate for Maud than Victoria, and Sean Dugan is overly tentative as both the black servant Joshua and the bad-boy boyfriend who pushes away an uncertain Edward at the moment he most needs companionship. If Macdonald hasn't brought the nimblest air of finality to the resolution of that rejection—where Edward goes from there, and what it means for both him and the people around him—he's still done well enough to keep you buzzing with bright appreciation even after the play has ended. It's a careful, honest reminder that happiness may not look like what we want or expect, but that we should keep our minds and hearts open for whatever we get along the way. The rest of the vehicle of Cloud Nine still looks and smells new, sure. But the lessons underneath are as timeless and rewarding as they come.
Cloud Nine
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