Derek Ahonen and Sarah Lemp play a married couple who have a lot to mouth off about in “Rantoul and Die.” (
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Before anybody’s said a word in “Rantoul and Die,” you have a pretty good idea that the play will be a warts-and-all look at working-class life.
First, it’s presented by the Amoralists, a company known for serving up explosive dysfunction with generous side helpings of violence and sex.
Second, this new black comedy is by Mark Roberts, who’s explored the travails of people in the Heartland in plays and in his sitcom creation, “Mike & Molly” — though “Rantoul and Die” is more aggro than the series and doesn’t feature any fat jokes.
Finally, Alfred Schatz’s set looks as if it were put together with the unloved remnants of a bunch of garage sales, then wrecked by a slob: There’s a Big Gulp on the floor, and a congealed peanut-butter sandwich stuck to a waffle iron.
We’re in Rantoul, Ill., and the ruler of this trashy empire is the weak, indecisive, self-pitying Rallis (Derek Ahonen). As if he weren’t annoying enough, Ahonen, himself the author of several Amoralists shows, gives him a grating whimper.
Rallis can’t do anything right, even bungling a suicide attempt after his wife, Debbie (Sarah Lemp), asks for a divorce.
And while Debbie has her own baggage — “You saw a burning house and decided to move into it,” Rallis’ buddy Gary tells him — you can’t blame her for wanting out.
No matter how much Rallis begs her, Debbie’s determined to leave him.
“I got wheels on me, and I ain’t slowing down in a school zone,” she tells her husband in one of Roberts’ many amusingly florid lines.
Even the cocky Gary (Matthew Pilieci) doesn’t provide much support. A low-rent philosopher king, he theorizes that you can’t fight nature — and Rallis’ nature is to be a loser.
That’s pretty much it in terms of plot, since this is the kind of play that begins and ends with the character descriptions — there’s no dramatic tension whatsoever.
In the second act, Roberts adds another ingredient to the mix with the arrival of Callie (Vanessa Vaché), Debbie’s colleague at Dairy Queen. Callie’s sure of herself under a bubbly, cat-lady exterior, compounding Roberts’ undernourished theme of driven women versus ineffectual men.
Along with some snappy dialogue, “Rantoul and Die” is blessed with smart, naturalistic acting. Vaché suggests Callie’s steely spine underneath her Midwestern “oh my gosh” cutesiness. And Lemp makes Debbie understandably frustrated and harried rather than merely bitchy — the actress is the sharpest weapon in the Amoralists’ quiver.
But their best efforts can’t prevent the show from getting bogged down in chatty scenes that go around in circles. And holding patterns are just as frustrating onstage as they are on planes.