“Sea Glass” is billed as a contemporary feminist retelling of Cain and Abel, so I knew how it would end. Oddly, the ending felt tacked on – one of the reasons why Olivia Dennehy-Basile’s script ultimately didn’t work for me. Until that abrupt ending, I didn’t see much of a connection to the Biblical story, and, although the two main characters are sisters rather than brothers, I didn’t see much discernibly feminist about it either. There were some memorable exchanges along the way, but the longer the play went on (and it went on too long), the less I saw the point of it.
Yet if I struggled to appreciate the script, I’m not sorry I attended the production, because it features a promising young cast, especially Shaelin McKenna and Bryn Frazee as the sisters, both of whom are making their Off-Broadway debuts. Both cast and creative team are apparently connected through NYU, students of director Jennifer McCabe (The seeds for the script, Dennehy-Basile has said, began as a writing exercise in her senior year at NYU. At least one of the actors, Frazee, is still a student there.) Whether or not their NYU association is relevant, most of the cast’s performances effectively relay a sense of the characters’ lived, and shared, experience.
“Sea Glass” takes place in 1979 in a beach house on Long Island, where two sisters, Anne Kilcullen (McKenna), 16, and Imogen Kilcullen (Frazee), 14, have been left on their own by their parents for at least four months. Their father Patrick (Andrei Dolezal) is an actor working in California (whom we only see making awkward phone calls to his daughters, apparently preferring to reach the answering machine while they’re at school); their mother Joan (whom we never see) has left them to go on an international educational cruise. It’s evident from the first scene that these are recklessly neglectful parents; Imogen is counting the cash that their mother has left them for food and gas and whatever else they need, which amounts to about $25 a week (which is clearly insufficient to meet the two teenagers’ daily needs even in 1979 dollars.)
Through a series of scenes and “interludes” (monologues separated from the main action), we learn that Imogen is studious and religious and reliable while older sister Anne is the opposite of all three (this is why it is Imogen to whom their mother has entrusted the cash.)
But Anne’s understanding of the world seems based on her personal experience, and not (as with Imogen) what the nuns at their Catholic school have instructed them to believe. Among the most entertaining and thought-provoking scenes is one in which Imogen is helping Anne with her school essay in fulfillment of the nun’s assignment: “What story is evidence to not turn from God?” Anne brings up Job, who did not “turn from God,” and as a result “Job’s life was miserable.”
Imogen: “Job stayed faithful and he was rewarded in the end. You have to stay faithful.”
Anne: “Great. Awesome for him. What about his children and wife?
Imogen: “He gets new ones.
Anne: “New ones. New ones. So if Dad suffers enough, he’s just allowed to replace us one day?”
Their argument, which continues with the sisters’ different worldviews about sacrifice, comes closest in the play to suggesting the sort of longstanding theological debate inspired by Biblical stories like Cain and Abel.
But it’s short-lived. “Sea Glass” spends more time with three brothers who live next door – Bill, the oldest and wisest at 18 (Cooper Musser), Mike (Zac Branciforte) the middle brother, a troublemaker who feels a connection to Anne (which figures in the final turn in the plot), and Toddy (Nick Snipes), the youngest, and the kindest, who is sweet on Imogen, but shy to express it. Then there is a suave older man, Alan, who is 23 (portrayed by Andrei Dolezal, who also portrays the sisters’ father) who tries to seduce Imogen just as two years earlier he (successfully) hit on Anne. This leads to a melee involving Alan and all three brothers at the sisters’ home, which results in Anne injuring her nose and Imogen breaking her arm – the point of which seems to be to end Act I with a theatrical flourish.
The final fight between the siblings is, yes, subtly driven by envy; Anne feels Mom and Dad favors Imogen. But it’s directly over money (which is perhaps why they refer to the retelling as “contemporary.”) The title of the play refers to a bowl where Imogen hides the money their parents gave them. But sea glass are bottles, jars, and other man-made glass items that have been abandoned on the beach and beaten down by the waves, sand, and saltwater into something colorful, smooth and durable. So there is some metaphorical heft here — some optimism, despite the ending, about characters abandoned at the beach house and beaten down by neglect. But since sea glass takes a long time to form – many years, at least; sometimes decades – might it also offer a cautionary but also encouraging message to the undeniably talented young theater artists who have put “Sea Glass” together?
Sea Glass
WP Theater through August 30
Running time: About an hour and 55 minutes, including intermission.
Written by Olivia Dennehy-Basile
Directed by Jennifer McCabe
Scenic design by Steven Kendall, lighting design by Ash Marlar. Costume and props design by Georgia Evans. Fight direction iby Fermin Serrano. Sarah Hasson is the stage manager
Cast: Shaelin McKenna as Anne , Bryn Frazee as Imogen, Nick Snipes as Toddy, Zac Branciforte as Mike, Cooper Musser as Bill, and Andrei Dolezal as Patrick and AlanJustin Chauncey.
Photos by Justin Chauncey.
