The futuristic drama focuses on four avengers -- sexually frustrated Holyman, waiflike Freegrrl, intellectual Ingen, and violent Angerboy. “He’s the leader of the group, but he’s ineffectual because he’s angry all the time,” says Johnston. “That’s how America responds to the world.” The play takes place in an empty department store, where the heroes map out a battle plan. But they soon find themselves in a “dysfunctional dystopia,” since the world’s oil reserves have dried up. “Everything has just stopped,” says Clyde Simon, Convergence-Continuum’s artistic director. “Society has completely collapsed. Everybody is destitute and homeless.”
Johnston wrote the first draft last winter. After a couple of stage readings, he tweaked the story to play up the characters’ survival instincts. Yet, Johnston and Simon both claim that the show is not a “message piece.” Rather, it’s an “awareness piece,” says Simon. “Of course, we try to steer things, because we have a pretty liberal point of view. But we simply try to get people to think and make up their own minds.”
Thursdays-Sundays, 8 p.m. Starts: July 14. Continues through Aug. 11
