SKELETON
Will Kern’s Skeleton is the kind of play that made Chicago theater famous. Like David Mamet’s Sexual Perversity in Chicago, it’s a Chicago love story, the tale of Annie, a deeply damaged woman, and Edge, the man who loves her desperately. They might be the boy and girl next door: they’re young, educated, unemployed, and losing hope. They walk by the lake, and the beach is covered with dead smelt. They fall in love, and their love is painfully hard to bear.
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Kern adds just the right amount of warmth and humor to soften the blows of his harsh story, and the result is a compelling drama, full of wit and sweet sadness. In a late-night production at Shattered Globe, under the direction of Wilson Milam, with Rebecca Jordan playing Annie and Jeff Still as Edge, Skeleton is an almost perfect show, beautiful, tragic, and hopeful all at once. And it handles a terribly delicate subject with admirable finesse.
With the help of the bartender at his favorite bar, Edge figures out why Annie’s gotten so upset, and the story takes a poignant turn. The situation is as painful for Edge as it is for Annie, and the resolution Kern provides doesn’t necessarily improve things for either of them.
