When husband and spouse journalists Dan and Iris Henniman spend weeks interviewing convicted serial killer, rapist, and kidnapper William Attain for a ebook they’ve been commissioned to put in writing about him and his murders of 19 girls, it has a dramatic affect on them and their relationship, as they start to contemplate not solely his motivation, but additionally their very own, together with the ethics of satisfying the ego and contributing to the celebrity of a confessed psycho-killer, in addition to these of a public that’s hungry for darkish and disturbing true-crime tales of such horrific violence and evil.
Introduced by GoodBadGroup for a restricted Off-Off-Broadway engagement at Arts on Web site, Down the Highway, by playwright Lee Blessing, accommodates graphic descriptions of homicide and sexual violence, impressed by precise previous occasions within the information. Below the path of Christian Ryan, the extreme three-hander delivers all of the suspense, revelations, and psychological insights, with performances that seize the event and feelings of the characters and the implications of the story in our society at massive.
The narrative strikes forwards and backwards between the motel room the place the couple is staying and a desk within the jail (easy and environment friendly set design by producer and technical director Richie Radici) at which they conduct their interrogations of the incarcerated killer, who has been denied his final enchantment and has nothing left to lose. However can his ugly and cold-blooded tell-all accounts be trusted, or is he simply embellishing the info and hinting that there’s extra to the story, in hope of a sequel publication down the street that may additional cement his infamy and place in historical past?
Within the roles of Iris and Dan, Quinn Jackson and Zachary Desmond are at first loving of their interactions and profitable makes an attempt at engendering a child lady (intimacy path by Stephanie Sutherland), and enthusiastic about their joint task, on a topic with which she’s had extra expertise and about which he’s a bit nervous. However because the story progresses, they turn out to be more and more argumentative and oppositional, and their attitudes transfer in several instructions, as soon as they see, hear, query, and report the killer (a time period he prefers to assassin, since “homicide has motives”) and attempt to unravel the reality about what he did, why he did it, and whether or not or not they need to profit from it. He haunts their ideas and manifests of their room; Iris tries to flee the stress by obsessing a couple of discarded scorching water heater on a porch reverse their window (a parallel of our throw-away tradition to the disposing of victims), and Dan by driving down the native freeway (considering its relationship to the rising nationwide homicide price because the street system’s development, by offering a simple route to move and discard them).
The excellent Jack Alberts turns in a chilling portrayal of the calculating unrepentant killer Invoice Attain, smiling, laughing, and licking his lips, manipulating his interviewers and setting the principles for what he’ll and received’t talk about, shedding his mood when pressed, out of the blue showing of their motel room as a phantom of their minds, making direct eye contact with the viewers, and giving everybody the creeps together with his detailed recounting of the brutal murders and his cavalier perspective.
Costumes by Aine Hegarty outline the standing and conditions of the characters, whereas a menacing soundscape by Misho Georgiev, with voiceovers of the tape recordings, and ominous lighting by Patrick Moriarty, with sudden blackouts and looming shadows, contribute to the alarming temper.
GoodBadGroup’s provocative manufacturing of Down the Highway is as a lot an indictment of remorseless killers as it’s of a society that’s fascinated by them and their stunning crimes. It is going to depart you considering the conscience of each.
Operating Time: Roughly 90 minutes, with out intermission.
Down the Highway performs by way of Sunday, November 19, 2023, at GoodBadGroup, acting at Arts on Web site, 12 St. Marks Place, NYC. For tickets (priced at $54, plus charges, together with one drink, an hour earlier than curtain time or after the present), go on-line. Masks are usually not required.