NEW YORK – JOB at the Helen Hayes Theater
It is a good thing that JOB, by Max Wolfe Friedlich, is at the Helen Hayes Theater. The Hayes is next to Sardi’s. Sardi’s is where you want to go after seeing this show because you will need to debrief. Don’t just toddle off home without having a drink (alcohol or mocktail) and chatting with your theatre companion. If by chance you have no companion, go in anyway because Jeremy, the upstairs bartender, has definite opinions on the conclusion of JOB. You can debrief with him.
I rarely have the privilege to see and review a production more than once. And when I have, it was certainly not a two-hander. Lucky for me, I got this opportunity with JOB. Because not only did I get to admire Friedlich’s writing’s intricacies, but I also got to witness this pas de deux between Peter Friedman and Sydney Lemmon. Talk about a study in acting.
The time is January 2020. We all remember that January…the location is outside of Silicon Valley. Jane (Lemmon) has had a few emotional issues, okay, a certified meltdown while on the job at a big tech company (We are told we know the one, but do we? Google is owned by Alphabet, who also owns FitBit and Waze. Facebook is now Meta and owns Instagram and What’s App. Even as we speak, start-ups are starting and being bought.). Jane’s meltdown went viral, and she was suspended from her job until she got the all-clear from a therapist. Lloyd (Friedman) is the therapist of choice, presumably hired by Jane’s company. Lloyd is the patron therapist of lost causes. He tells Jane that he is the best.
Jane’s job at the unnamed company is to ferret out objectionable posts on the Internet and banish them to Hell. But each time she does, a piece of her goes along for the ride so that by the time we meet her, there is little of Jane left. By objectionable, I do not mean “in bad taste.” I mean the kind of videos that are violent in ways we cannot imagine. Jane wants her job back because she is the line of defense. She tells Lloyd, “The internet isn’t some fringe “young people” thing anymore – it’s where we live. It’s our home and I am the front line of defense – there’s nobody else. All of the worst things in the world come right to my computer screen.”
Did I mention the gun?
It’s no secret as we see it right away. And while Jane agrees to put it away in her flimsy cloth bag, we never forget it is there. Neither does Lloyd. It is the gun that tips the scales and makes Lloyd a hostage. One could argue that he has plenty of time to dash out the door, but the action is so fast, and Jane so nimble that the image of them going toe to toe is not out of reach.
As it is, Jane more or less takes over Lloyd’s office, moving furniture and clearing off an end table to make into a seat. Jane bears the weight of the text as she scrambles to get enough of her thought process and circumstances out so that Lloyd will write the words that will give her her job back. Either that or, well, you know.awhileLloyd, on the other hand, must listen. And Friedman is a damn good listener. Lloyd must unravel this Rubrics Cube of a person who speaks in code.
He has to dip in like a laser surgeon and get out before Jane has time to lunge like a feral cat. Her life depends on it, and so may his, which is why the choice for Jane to give her two most important monologues to us instead of Lloyd was a mystery. We are depending on Lloyd to keep us grounded. We get our cues from his reactions. When the focus is entirely on Jane, we are lost. It takes us a while to get righted again. Unfortunate.
The dialogue here is like a tennis match on steroids. Just when you think a point is made, an invisible umpire calls “foul,” and you are back to an even score. Lloyd is the solid place against which Jane hurls her whole self. Without Lloyd, there would be no Jane. She would burst into flame and disappear.
Even as the story winds up, the game piles high with Aces and match points until the stakes become life and death.
While the text is often lumpy and filled with switchbacks, the superb performances of Friedman and Lemmon are the centerboard on this vessel. Friedman’s text allows us to fasten ourselves to the whirlpool that is their relationship. We stay there until we are asked to disembark with a final scene that leaves us gasping.
Tell Jeremy we sent you.
JOB at the Helen Hayes Theater
By Max Wolf Friedlich
Directed by Michael Herwitz
WITH Peter Friedman and Sydney Lemmon
Scenic design by Scott Penner, costume design by Michelle J. Li, lighting design by Mextly Couzin, sound design by Cody Spencer, and original music by Devonté Hynes.
At The Helen Hayes Theater. Through September 29. Tickets HERE
Readers may also enjoy our reviews of Inspired by True Events, A Hundred Circling Camps, Oh Mary!, The Journals of Adam & Eve: The World’s First Love Story, The Edge of Nature at La Mama, Empire the Musical at New World Stages, If These Wigs Could Talk by Panti Bliss at the Irish Arts Center, and Elevator Repair Service Ulysses.