Word: nora
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...play opens as Tom's wife Nora and her youngest daughter Gail find Gail's husband, Junior, lying in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor. From the first moment it is clear that Nora is off her rocker, an impression wonderfully conveyed by Brittani Sonnenberg '03, whose character manages to remain light and amusing even in the most insane situations. A case in point is the discovery of Junior's body. As Gail tries to help her husband, Nora talks incessantly, theorizing about calling 911, about the seriousness of Junior's bruises, about her relationship with Gail...
This first scene sets the pace and the degree of absurdity for the entire play. Next, the household widens as a man who, according to Nora, "looks like Tom" appears to be living upstairs in a semi-comatose state. This man is, in fact, Tom himself, who 10 years prior had abused the family, tried to burn the house down and abandoned them, and who is now back and recognized by everybody save for his wife. His daughters' reactions to him are mixed. Gail, who is tough, street-smart and devoted to the family, has forgiven him and even cooks...
...through the play, the plot slows down considerably, yet this is made up for by a series of scenes showing the four starring women sitting around the kitchen table, nursing their neuroses and trying to set their family right. During this time, Mary Ann outs Elizabeth as a lesbian, Nora tries to reform Mary Ann with elaborate guilt trips about motherhood and Elizabeth frantically searches for any household product that can give her a quick high. The current of hostility running between the three sisters is sharp and well done. Less convincing are the few sentimental moments, as the chemistry...
Just as the four women seem irretrievably lost in their mental tangle, a threat pulls them back together. This threat comes as the two cops find drugs in the house's basement and arrest Nora. To this challenge, the other characters respond each in her own fashion. Elizabeth captures and tortures one of Junior's assailants in the hope of making him confess to the drug dealership. Mary Ann confronts her father and finally comes to terms with him. Gail fetches Junior from the hospital, who, in an ironic twist, proves to have been in a secret alliance with...
...that was long ago and far away. Some months after Carl and Nora and I sat up all night, Richard Nixon declared that his mother was a saint, and flew away to San Clemente. Carl and Nora were married, had two children, and then were rather vividly divorced. Nora wrote a novel about it, "Heartburn." Hollywood made a movie of "All the President's Men," wherein Deep Throat looks nothing like the seal-sleek John Sears. History's image of Deep Throat became the gaunt and shadowy Hal Holbrook, in the same way that, for purposes of myth, Carl...