Box Set, WNEP Theater. Two solo shows of short comic sketches by ImprovOlympic veterans have been packaged together here, though it’s not clear why: they have very different themes, and while one is sterling enough to stand on its own, the other needs rethinking.
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Something Suite, written and performed by Dina Facklis and directed by Paul Grondy, is exceptional. Facklis takes pleasure in the incongruities of human nature, especially those brought out by extreme situations: a housewife prepares dinner while responding to accusations that she tried to commit suicide; a sweet-voiced recording artist lays down tracks for a song about bestiality; a doctor explains that she didn’t tell her pregnant patient about possibly fatal complications because she wanted to ramp up the drama of the birth. Facklis’s characters are tears-in-the-eyes funny not because of what they say but because of who they are under pressure.
