Theater review: Richard Greenberg's 'Three Days of Rain' at 1st Stage

Symmetry is often the hallmark of pleasing architecture (apologies to the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao and its ilk). So it's fitting that Richard Greenberg should have built that quality into "Three Days of Rain," his 1997 drama about two famous architects and the tangled emotional legacies they bequeath. Director Dawn McAndrews exploits the symmetry proficiently in her largely absorbing and poignant production of "Three Days" for 1st Stage, a fledgling theater company in Northern Virginia.

Greenberg's three-performer play has two acts, set in 1995 and 1960 respectively. In the first, the cast plays articulate 30-somethings coping with a death; in Act 2, each performer depicts a parent of the character he or she portrayed in Act 1. So the play unfolds like an archaeological dig, with the past gradually shedding light on the confusion of the present.

McAndrews and her capable actors cook up markedly different, but complementary, emotional temperatures for the two acts, set in the same Manhattan apartment. (The semi-abstract loftlike design, its stark wall and floor marked with architectural notations, is credited to Mark Krikstan, 1st Stage's artistic director.) Camping out in the loft in 1995 is Walker (Lucas Beck), the prickly, neurotic son of a revered architect named Edmund Janeway. After missing his father's funeral, Walker reunites with his no-nonsense sister Nan (Belen Pifel) for a reading of Dad's will. Joining them is their friend Pip (Brian Razzino), a cheerful soap-opera star whose father was Janeway's partner.

Displaying an impressively natural speaking style and aptly hesitant body language, McAndrews's actors create an atmosphere of angst for this stretch of the play: These well-off East Coasters, who use words like "bricolage" and "quasi-paternal," live in a haze of irony and hesitancy, making do with small ambitions. (In what seems to be a directorial choice, the performers rarely meet each other's eyes in this act -- a tic that conveys the complexities of the relationships, but for the audience it becomes irritating.)

In Act 2, the vibe is all ambitious sincerity. Jettisoning the expressive hangdog air he uses for Walker, Beck exudes charismatic shyness as the character's father. Pifel shifts eloquently from the hard-eyed tenseness of Nan to the bubbly Southern warmth of Lina, Nan and Walker's mother. And Razzino pivots from Pip's easygoing optimism to the hot-tempered brooding of Theo, Pip's father.

Jim Alexander's bold lighting -- casting dramatic shadows when characters step to the front for monologues -- adds an extra dollop of flair to this very creditable production, the second offering in 1st Stage's second season.

Wren is a freelance writer.

Three Days of Rain

by Richard Greenberg. Directed by Dawn McAndrews; sound design, Alison Daniels; costumes, Cheryl Patton Wu; fight choreography, Lorraine Ressegger. About 2 hours 15 minutes. Through Nov. 22 at 1st Stage, 1524 Spring Hill Rd., McLean. Call 703-845-1856 or visit http://www.1stStageSpringHill.org.