If there’s one thing we can learn from “A Perfect Future,” it’s that politics and heavy drinking don’t mix.
Nor does it make for particularly interesting theater.
David Hay’s new play is one of those tiresomely familiar comic dramas in which a dinner party begins in polite fashion only to wind up in a drunken orgy of recriminations, revelations and verbal attacks.
Considering the ridiculous number of wine bottles littering the stage by the end of the evening, it’s a wonder it doesn’t also include vomiting and passing out.
As the play begins, we witness the reunion of a long-married 50-something couple, John (Michael T. Weiss) and Natalie (Donna Bullock), and their old friend Elliot (Daniel Oreskes), all veterans of the ’60s counterculture, in the couple’s beautifully appointed Manhattan apartment.
Natalie and Elliot are still idealists. She’s working on a documentary about Rwanda and proudly displays her original edition of “Das Kapital,” while he’s heading a committee to raise legal defense funds for a Black Muslim who’s been arrested as a “domestic terrorist.”
“I think we’re the last generation to have any political passion,” Natalie complains, which is odd since her husband’s now an oil-company VIP with a personal sommelier and lavish wine collection.
Adding to the combustible mix is the arrival of John’s callow young protégé, Mark (Scott Drummond), and the sexual tension that develops between him and the older Elliot. As the wine flows freely, the foursome’s differing values rise to the surface in all too predictable, Edward Albee-like fashion: Thankfully, nobody suggests a game of “hump the hostess.”
Director Wilson Milam (“The Lieutenant of Inishmore”) doesn’t manage to bring anything fresh to the proceedings, although he’s elicited fine performances from the talented ensemble. Still, by the end of this tedious evening, you may crave a drink or two yourself.