Marianna McClellan as Annie. Photo by Cat Cheng
Annie is young. She’s lovely. She is desperately hunting for an apartment for herself and has found this one, not too shabby, not too expensive but too gabby a super, who seems intent on selling her the beauties of the place. There are none. She doesn’t care. She takes the apartment, can’t wait to get rid of Dal, the super. And collapses on the floor in a flood of tears. Abruptly, the door opens and a young man comes in telling her to lock her door in future, then proceeds to extract from her the reasons for her deep unhappiness. He’s Donald, he’s from across the hall in 3B. Which is all Annie needs. But her greater need is to spill her guts about her tragedy. Why are we not surprised. Donald is very sympathetic. Aha? You could be wrong, and you are.
Annie works at the local PBS station. She’s a fund raiser. In a fit of fund raising ennui, she departs from script and blurts out that Big Bird will die if viewers don’t send in contributions. This gets her off early, even though the phones start to ring. And that is the tragedy. Because when she gets home earlier than usual, the first thing she sees is her true love’s bare ass and the next thing she notices is that there are lovely female legs wrapped around his neck. (Sidebar: This brings us around to the logo illustration for the play: two polar bears getting it on. Don’t worry. Playwright Daniels works his clarification into a theme.) Things are apparently clear enough for Annie. She bolts. And that is why she is in Apartment 3A. Donald appreciates her woe and just to prove he is a straight shooter – dear me – and not on the make, he shows her a picture of his beautiful wife with whom he is deeply in love, so let’s not get any funny ideas, shall we. He cajoles Annie into trying to see the bright side, to give life a chance.
Elliot, who works at the station with Annie, is clearly nuts about her, defends her killing off Big Bird in part because – it seems to have brought in more money than the usual pitch but chiefly because she’s sheer perfection. With Donald on his side unbeknownst to him Annie gives Elliot a chance. Soon, it’s more than a chance and she is doing the legs around Elliot’s neck which Elliot finds super exciting because it reminds me of their most popular show: about the sex life of polar bears, who apparently like this particular position more than all the others. (You see? Logo accounted for.) (Not that we get an explanation of why Annie cottons to this particular gymnastic. You’d think she would have been turned off by having seen what it did for her last love. Or maybe that’s simplistic and this is deeper. Intellectually.) Unfortunately, at the moment she is completely legs up or head over heels or whatever, she sees Donald of all people and blurts out, “Donald!” Which deeply disconcerts Elliot. It disconcerts Annie even more. Why is she seeing Donald right before her eyes in this moment of bliss? And, of course, Elliot, being even more blissed out, sees only Annie. Mysterious as well as sexy?
Playwright Daniels’ rationalization for all this is somewhat metaphysical, and were it not for his charmingly involved cast, one might begin to look closer at the questions of faith and love he raises. However, director Owen M. Smith knows what he’s doing. You cannot act metaphysics; you can act relationships and character and story. And his concentration on same makes Apartment 3A a satisfying evening in the theater, even lending an air or surprise to the ending. Marianna McClellan makes a splendid Annie and Doug Nyman does fine as Donald but it is Jay Rohloff who makes Elliot real, invaluable to the play. Olga Mill’s setting serves well as three settings thanks to the lighting team of Joshua Windhausen and Taryn Kennedy.
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Apartment 3A. At the Beckett Theater,410. W. 42nd St. Tues-Sat 8 pm, Mats Sat 2pm, Sun 3 pm through Feb 16. Tickets: $25 at ticketcentral.com or 212-2279-4200.
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Apartment 3A. What is it about the love making of polar bears which exerts a metaphysical spell over these young lovers?