 The Very Little Theatre concluded its 81st season with Dinner with Friends, a Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Donald Margulies. This candid, often-funny comedy/drama explores the bittersweet side of friendship through the eyes of two best-friend married couples. Invited to dinner at the suburban home of husband-and-wife food critics Gabe and Karen, Beth reveals she’s breaking up with her husband Tom after 12 years of marriage and two children.
Tom, who had been away on business, finds out that Beth has told their friends about the looming divorce, and hastens to Gabe and Karen's home. Tom and Beth had planned to tell their friends about their breakup together, but Tom now believes that Beth has unfairly presented herself as the wronged party, and feels he must present his own side of the story.
The unexpected revelation forces Gabe and Karen, who at first feel compelled to choose sides, to reevaluate their seemingly perfect relationship. The effects of Tom and Beth's breakup on Gabe and Karen cause them to begin to question their friendship with two people who seem to be refusing the life they all once worked so hard to preserve.
Over the course of the play, we see both couples at different ages and stages of their lives. The story is cleverly told through a flashback in Act II to the beginning of the couples’ friendship.
“A breezy comedy of modern manners that turns poignant and deeply affecting by its end. Margulies touches chords that resonate with a deep affecting humanity.”
San Francisco Examiner |
