Jack’s Precious Moment | Theater review

New York playwright Samuel D. Hunter has proven popular among Chicago storefronts recently; Jack’s Precious Moment is his third work on a Chicago stage in the past year. Like I Am Montana and A Bright New Boise, at Mortar Theatre Company and LiveWire Chicago Theatre, respectively, this piece reveals an ambitious playwright grappling with big issues but failing to create coherent theater.

The play has an incredibly confused tone. While it begins with an earnest monologue by Bib (an appealing Ed Porter) about his brother’s violent death, we mostly meet characters we’re meant to laugh off—from Bib’s father, a paranoid right-wing Christian, to a haiku-reciting, drug-addicted housewife. Poetry and Christianity are big jokes here.

Hunter’s obsessions are intriguing, and his vision of a dystopic late-capitalist America can feel both true and sad (from wandering meth heads to opportunistic war contractors); it’s a land of not much opportunity. Still, we’re not allowed much in the way of a journey. Bib should be the center of the play; it’s his struggle to reconcile himself to his abusive brother’s death that leads to his compelling spiritual crisis. Yet instead of pursuing the questions posed, the script repeatedly reverts to lame jokes (“male nurse” is apparently a hilarious put-down) and a preoccupation with creepy Americana kitsch, like Precious Moments figurines. There’s promise here, but it doesn’t go anywhere. Azar Kazemi’s direction emphasizes the script’s wackiness; by the end, various final movements toward sentimental resolution come off as cloying and false.