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Reborning

Reviewed by Elizabeth Wachtel

Fountain Theatre

Through March 15th

A “reborn” doll is a bespoke creation that is made to resemble a human baby with the highest degree of verisimilitude possible.  Collectible items, these expensive dolls are sometimes created for clients as hyper realistic likenesses of children who died in infancy. This phenomenon is the inspiration for Zayd Dohrn’s Reborning, which is currently having its Los Angeles premiere at the Fountain Theatre under Simon Levy’s sure-handed direction.

Dohrn’s play centers on Kelly (a heartbreaking Joanna Strapp), an art school graduate who has a booming online business creating reborns. Her meticulous work is featured throughout the play on a high quality video projection screen that stands at the center of designer Jeff McLaughlin’s detailed recreation of a New York loft. The opening image of baby doll parts and craft organizers combined with beer bottles and rolled joints sets the tone for Dohrn’s unique brand of dark comedy. At the beginning of the play we learn that Kelly has mastered the fabrication of naturalistic skin from her boyfriend Daizy (an endearing Ryan Doucette), who creates tailor made phalluses for exacting online clients. A fellow art school graduate, Daizy’s nonconformist name (given to him by his hippie parents) belies the relative normality of his childhood, particularly when compared with the trauma Kelly experienced as an infant. 

The play’s comic setup quickly spirals into gloomier territory with the entrance of Emily (an outstanding Kristin Carey), who has commissioned Kelly to make a likeness of her long deceased infant daughter. Set on possessing a perfect double of her child, Emily demands more and more of an increasingly fragile Kelly who becomes obsessed with the project. As the play progresses, the stakes escalate until Kelly is forced to confront the darkest parts of her past.

Dohrn’s tightly constructed, 80-minute play packs a punch; in the hands of its exceptional cast, the economical dialogue radiates wit while remaining full of emotional intensity. Nowhere is this potency more present than in Strap’s potent portrayal of Kelly’s horrifying decline. Peter Bayne’s empathetic sound design leads the audience through Kelly’s psychological fall with music choices that expertly convey each mood swing, agitation, sorrow and fear.

At times, references to psychoanalysis — particularly when phalluses and babies are literally thrown around the set — make it seem as though Dohrn is forcing a Freudian literary critique of his own play. However Doucette’s winsome performance as the flippant but very loving Daizy softens moments that might otherwise come across as heavy-handed and pretentious. In the end, it is Carey’s vivid portrayal of willed restraint in the face of deep grief and rage that pulls both Kelly and the play together into a probing and provocative exploration of healing in the face of great tragedy.

The Fountain Theatre, 5060 Fountain Ave., E. Hlywd; Thurs.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 p.m.; through March 15. (323) 663-1525, FountainTheatre.com