Kyra Sedgwick and Julia Conroy

Kyra Sedgwick, thin, attractive, and singular looking, plays Faye Garrit, wearing a fur coat, sunglasses, and heels as she enters a nifty-looking cabin during an off-peak winter time. (The accurate design, by Takeshi Kata, includes engaging trees and sky) A woman whose marriage is dissolving, Faye brings her daughter Julia Conroy (Mary Wiseman) with her. Julia is a convent student who admits her devotion to God. Faye's shades are removed to reveal a black eye. Her husband Manny (Jeremy Davidson) is a former St. Louis Cardinals baseball player who loves her but, when his temper explodes, anything can happen—and will.

On the scene from time to time and providing comic relief is Faye's mother Mrs. Bennet, given one hilarious turn by the esteemed Estelle Parsons who, at 87 years of age, is a pistol of an actress with terrific timing. Mrs. Bennett wants the best for both her daughter and granddaughter and feels she has the market on knowledge.

Inge's plot finds Faye and taxi-driver Gino (Aaron Costa Ganis) falling, with a charge of lust, for one another. The more moving, loving, and complex sexuality, however, features Julia and her young man, Victor Burns (Daniel Sharman). It actually appears that these two appealing actors are incapable, physically, of resisting one another. In the end, Julia will choose between Vic and faithfulness to the Almighty. After she and Vic are together, Julia is at a loss for words other than to say she has changed. Eventually, she tells him that "I just don't feel I'm made to be a wife." I felt like jumping onto the stage to offer some words to these sweet people.

Faye, too, is conflicted: she could return to her husband who, when not binging on alcohol, is a teddy bear type. She gets on well with her good friend Jimmy Woodford (Howard W. Overshown), another intriguing man who stops by the cabin. Jimmy runs his art gallery and obviously enjoys hanging out with Faye. Were he not gay, Faye would probably hitch with him.

Kyra Sedgwick's task is not easy, since her character is neither exceptionally likable nor repulsive. She is trying to find her way which, during the early to mid 1960s, is not easy for a middle-aged woman. That Inge set his play in middle America is significant. Faye comes from some upper level of society and here she is renting a place in the middle of nowhere. Her world, perhaps, is shutting down while her daughter's could be expanding. At one point Faye says, "I wake up every morning feeling like a fungus."

It should be fun to track the future careers of both Mary Wiseman and Daniel Sharman, each of whom is warmly impressive as a young lover.

It is director Evan Cabnet's challenge to take an old play (even if produced for the first time) and find its spine, stay true to the text, and, given an excellent group of actors, realize its promise. William Inge's works include Picnic, Bus Stop,Come Back, Little Sheba, Dark at the Top of the Stairs, and the movie script for Splendor in the Grass

The WTF presentation moves along by increments from exposition until its conclusion. Certainly, one cares about what is to happen to the key individuals. During the final hour, the ante is upped and, while it all seems a tad melodramatic, the theatergoer is fully drawn in. Inge was a giant of a playwright during the 20th century and this is not his foremost masterpiece. Still, the language, the romantic melancholy, and the level of performance all make it most worthwhile.

Off the Main Road continues at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Williamstown, Massachusetts through July 19th. For tickets, call (413) 597-3400 or visit wtfestival.org.

Photo: Paul Fox

- Fred Sokol