Blue Ridge
Written by Abby Rosebrock
Directed by Taibi Magar
Atlantic Theatre Company – Linda Gross Theatre
January 4, 2019
Production website
💉💉 out of 5.

Tell me this isn’t a provocative  blurb offered about the play – – “A progressive high-school teacher with a rage problem retaliates against her unscrupulous boss and is sentenced to six months at a church-sponsored halfway house, where she attends to everyone’s recovery but her own.”

I love to see new work and Atlantic Theater is a home to some of the best in the city.  Blue Ridge is one of those new plays written by Abby Rosebrock and nurtured by the Atlantic Theatre Company.  I am not the biggest fan of realism on stage.  Sometimes I feel like I am watching a television show on stage.

  I often feel that the creative team is not using all of the gifts of live theatre to bring the story to life.  Blue Ridge was one of those TV plays.  That said – it was quite a good TV play.  The setting of a church-sponsored halfway house in the Appalachian mountains was a perfect place to find some wonderful, unique and funny characters.  

Marin Ireland as Alison brought a wonderful sense of character creation.  She was certainly a dynamo on stage and one could never predict where a moment was going to lead her.  It was hard to take your eyes off of her.  The play was at its best in the first act as it introduced all the characters in this halfway house and let them bounce off each other at the weekly bible study.  The playwright could not have picked a more interesting collage of characters.  Clearly the themes of “heal yourself – before seeking to heal others” and “never, ever, never have a relationship with someone in recovery – especially if you, yourself, are in recovery” played out in bold colors.   Both led to see funny and some no-way funny moments in life and in this story.

The play was less successful in the second act when the playwright was rushing the story to have a redemption or teaching a lesson.   The comedy of the first act just didn’t lead me to care enough about them to follow them through the consequences of their behavior.  Funny it was!  A bit too much TV for me – indeed.