One look at the stage design for “Hir,” now at Live Theatre Workshop, you know there is chaos in store.
Clothes are strewn around. Trash clutters the floor. Dirty dishes spill out of the sink. The walls are stained and are riddled with holes.
The chaos is not in this dark comedy by Taylor Mac. It’s the internal chaos of the wonderful characters the playwright conjured up.
In “Hir,” Isaac, a dishonorably discharged Marine, has returned home to find the house messy and in disrepair. His father, Arnold, is post-stroke, almost wordless and shuffles around the house in a daze and clown makeup and wig. He is dressed in a red nightgown, courtesy of the mother, Paige. Before the crippling stroke, Arnold demanded order in the house, was abusive and belittling. Paige gets her revenge by feeding him estrogen and insisting on a messy house. Paige is somewhat of an anarchist and has become a self-proclaimed philosopher.
“There is no such thing as male or female,” she tells an understandably confused Isaac. Her theory is everyone is a bit transgender, gay and Black. Isaac, she insists, is a little bit gay.
Then there is Max, Isaac’s sibling. Hir is the pronoun Max now prefers over her or him. Max is filled with adolescent angst and is militant about gay, lesbian and transgender and Max’s own theories.
This nuanced play, beautifully directed by Maryann Green, is packed with conflicted characters who struggle to survive in a world — and home — gone wild.
And this cast brought those characters to full life. Avis Judd was simply stunning as Paige, who tries to hide her anger with joviality but lets it out when her husband displeases her with any of his limited actions. When he does something she doesn’t approve of, she squirts him with water as though he was a misbehaving puppy. This is one of the best things we’ve seen Judd do — and we’ve seen her do many wonderful things on stage.
Michael Woodson’s Arnold barely spoke, but Woodson never got out of character, fidgeting with his nightgown, sitting awkwardly when told to, lost in his confused state of mind.
Olive Adams as Max was infuriating as a belligerent teen, and heart-breaking as a person trying to assert who they are. The son, Isaac, is horrified at the cruelty of Max and his mom toward a father who had been so cruel himself and tries to restore order to the house and his father’s mind. Jake Montgomery made Isaac’s confusion and pain palpable.
“Hir” is a comedy about a family in crisis and a world that is changing. See it and you’ll want to discuss it.
“Hir” continues through Sept. 24 at Live Theatre Workshop, 3322 N. Fort Lowell Road. Tickets are $17-$23 at livetheatreworkshop.org or 520-327-4242. The play runs about 2 hours with one intermission.
