For people who grew up in the 1980s, astronomer Carl Sagan’s PBS series Cosmos provided a first introduction to the world of cosmological science. Nick Payne’s Constellations, playing at American Players’ Touchstone Theater through Sept. 28, is a play that attempts to bridge the divide between science and art. In watching this brief but engrossing play, members of the audience may learn something about quantum theory but, like any good art, Constellations makes us feel something too.
The premise of Constellations is that we may be experiencing our lives in one timeline and in one universe, but there may be infinite other timelines/universes playing out at the same time. The play’s dialog starts out somewhat absurdly. The two characters, Marianne (Phoebe González) and Roland (Casey Hoekstra) are meeting for the first time at a backyard party. Marianne is an astrophysicist, so she shoulders some of the burden of explaining what this odd play is all about. The characters exchange a few lines of dialog, then seemingly rewind and say the same lines (or nearly so) but with slightly different vocal inflections, different responses, different outcomes. Just when we think the play will get nowhere, the characters move forward a bit in time. After so many repetitive lines, it’s a relief when they do move forward.
Over the course of the 70-minute play, we see the two characters grow and change, and due to the multiple timelines, their life courses intersect in unexpected ways.
Scott Penner’s scenic design is about as sparse as a set could be. The two characters interact on a barren carpeted square with a wall of convex mirrors behind them that subtly bend the stage lights. Keith Parham’s lighting design is almost a third character in the play, controlling when the actors freeze, and start and re-start their scenes. (Audiences are warned before entering the theater that strobe lightning effects will be used.) At some moments during the performance, the entire theater is thrown into pitch blackness. It’s a bit disorienting, as would be expected when we are playing with multiple universes.
González and Hoekstra handle this challenge like agile gymnasts. They deliver the same lines in many different ways, convincing us that each delivery is a profoundly true response to the other character.
As the characters grow, sometimes apart and sometimes together, Vanessa Stalling’s snappy direction steers the audience to happy endings and others where tragedy strikes. Constellations is a difficult play to describe, but not hard to understand. And audiences will be thinking about Marianne and Roland’s many possible outcomes for a long time to come.
