A Review of “The Bed Trick” - Where Plot Challenges Credulity

   

Say What?  Who’d expect that a theater audience would be so gullible as to fall for a plot device that hinges on an ardent lover climbing into bed expecting to find his mate only to be deceived by an imposter who’s stealthily taken her place?  I mean, no matter how dark the bed chamber, such deception should soon be discovered. Right? 

Wrong! Turns out literature is full of similar stories starting with the Biblical account of how Laban tricked Jacob into sleeping with his older daughter Leah when he thought he was sleeping with his younger daughter, Rachel, on their wedding night no less.

A little bit of research turned up a surprising number of literary works with a similar plot device including those written by Chaucer, in Arthurian romance, Greek mythology, Hindu literature and, most notably, Shakespeare in “Measure for Measure” and “All’s Well that Ends Well.”

Bringing a modern twist to the ploy to the stage is playwright, Keiko Green,   in her 2024 dark comedy, “The Bed Trick.” Now getting a staging at the Pittsburgh Playhouse downtown, the lengthy 135-minute long look at sexual legerdemain, loose relationships and duplicity, all set within the framework of Shakespeare’s “All’s Well That Ends Well.”

The plot is centered around three college roommates who share a dorm room, cleverly fabricated by scenic designer, Barrett Lage.  Lulu (Chloe Sohngen), Marianne (Quinn Starett) and Harriet (Amalea Krill) maneuver through a rather spacious room with walls covered with posters, cards and other pin ups, a bunk bed at one end a single bed on the other and a window in the middle that gives the room an airy, fresh look.

As Hariett, a theater major coincidentally rehearsing for a role in “All’s Well That Ends Well,” Krill starts the play of on a strong foot. With a twinkle in her eye that says let’s let the fun begin, she opens with an orated prologue a la the plays of Shakespeare that provides clue as to what’s to come. She also segues in and out of the play acting as one of the dorm mates and the narrator, sometimes quoting lines from The Bard as a way of tying the two-story lines together.

Sharing the bunk bed with Marianne, Lulu is more sexually aware than her two roommates. In fact, she’s in a relationship with Willis (Caleb Clemons), a sexually aware youth who recently seems to have developed a wandering eye and has been caught on an online dating app.

Feisty and proud, Lulu plans her revenge with the help of her roomies and an online post of her own that goes much awry. One betrayal leads to another as the self-admitted virginal Marianne plays the pivotal role as the major player in the bed trick. In contrast to Sohnger’s flash and party-girl vibe, Starratt is a lot more insecure in her sexuality. Her pent-up hormones seem produce a nervous fidgetiness and she does a great job playing a conflicted young women ready to act on her impulses yet resisting them with a strongly imprinted sense of propriety. To watch her play out this bifurcated conundrum fashions one of the play’s most amusing elements.

Balancing the youthful energy of the college students are Marianne’s parents, Barry (Griffin Sommers) and Anna ((Peyton Collins), a couple with a hidden bed trick of their own. Though young actors themselves, they manage to covey the appearance and demeanor of the older generation. As characters they show that, as a recently divorced couple, they too are struggling with post-separation issues and hauntings of past missteps in their relationship.

Collins is hilarious as a potential cougar now living in Florida with an attraction to alcohol. In one scene she ventures near the audience, mike in hand, brazenly singing “Escape (The Pina Collada Song),” then asks a nearby member of the audience to finish a line of the lyrics.

Director Anya Hilpert, keeps this tale of interrelationship dynamics, friendship and the strains placed upon it, and coming of age snags that extend into adulthood, moving at a comfortably fast-moving clip. She may also be credited for embellishing the culminating scene whereby the play gets a Shakespearean fanfare when the actors don regal robes and civilian garb characteristic of the players in Shakespeare’s “All’s Well That Ends Well.”

“The Bed Trick” is at the Pittsburgh Playhouse’s Conservatory Theatre Company, 305 Forbes Avenue, in Downtown Pittsburgh through October 25. For more information and tickets, phone 412-392-8000 or click on https://playhouse.culturaldistrict.org/production/108868/the-bed-trick.