What Is It Good For?

The War Party

by Mark Cofta

MOUTHING OFF: Susan Wilder (left) and Meghan Heimbecker breathe life into a play far less compelling than last week's presidential election. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

I wonder if I would have appreciated The War Party before Nov. 4.

Vincent Delaney's not-so-funny comedy at InterAct Theatre Co., set late on election night, makes a fictional hash of the issues inundating us since what feels like forever. Susan Wilder plays Republican Sen. Laura Smith, prowling her empty war room after a crushing defeat, swilling champagne and lobbing hors d'oeuvres at sycophantic volunteer Jessie (Meghan Heimbecker).

Like most two-person plays (though there's a third character — keep reading), The War Party depends much on revelation: We gradually learn that Jessie is more than a gushing admirer and that Laura not only chose to hide personal information that may have cracked her perfectly coiffed dragon lady image but also refused to go negative (making her a most unusual Republican).

While the campaign commentary is often amusing — "You could have made yourself so much more human," Jessie asserts, insisting that Laura's opponent's more fashionable hair was the key factor in her 72 percent victory — Delaney twists Jessie into a pinball of a character, careening to and fro with dizzying reversals until we don't know or trust her true intentions. She might be starstruck, romantically drawn to Laura, studying political science, spying for Democrats, smarting over a failed affair with one of Laura's rich donors, reporting undercover for NPR — or any or all or none of the above. Dynamic Heimbecker makes the twists interesting, but the result isn't a comprehensible character; when anything's possible, nothing's believable.

The War Party focuses more successfully on Laura's psyche. Wilder reveals her personal and professional disappointments through an appropriately boisterous, boozy, brooding performance. Then Delaney throws in the oddest (but not particularly funny or satirical) turn: Laura is visited by the ghost or vision of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (Tim Moyer). Though his appearance is rationalized (via Laura's diabetic blackouts, which come and go with convenient ease), it's not justified; Durk Durossett's set works cleverly to make FDR's presence theatrically tidy, but his contribution to the play's ridiculously optimistic ending isn't pulled off nearly so well in director Rebecca Wright's production.

If we hadn't just survived the world's longest campaign ever, would The War Party feel more provocative? I don't think so. If anything, recent events prove that truth is not only stranger than fiction, but also more humorous, more logical and more inspiring.

(m_cofta@citypaper.net)

The War Party | Through Nov. 23, InterAct Theatre Co., 2030 Sansom St., 215-568-8077, interacttheatre.org