#danclegg

[atulba]

Mahalo to @jppmonveggies and #DanClegg @monsantohawaii for partnering with @bravehawaii #berespectfulandvalueeveryone #feedingtheworld (at Oahu)

[twoontheaisle]

“Chester Bailey” at ACT’s Strand Theater

ACT’s world premiere production of Joseph Dougherty’s thrilling new play, Chester Bailey, is a blessing for the Bay Area, which hosts so few major debuts, at least of this quality. This relatively straightforward two-hander about the lies we tell ourselves to reconcile our inner worlds with uncomfortable reality is a compelling 90 minutes that draws you in from its first moments and never lets go until its final, uplifting (in a heart-rending sort of way) resolution.

The titular character is a young New Jersey-ite whose parents use their small influence to secure a job for their son at the local shipyard. This war-supportive duty means Chester (Dan Clegg) can spend his days riveting inside the hulls of ships instead of going into battle. Every evening, instead of k-rations, Chester gets mom’s home cooking. But when he is horribly injured on the job, he retreats into an unshakeable delusion.

Enter Dr. Cotton (David Straithairn), who is tasked with finding a way to bring Chester back to reality. Straithairn gives a marvelously natural and easy-flowing performance as a psychiatrist with very real issues of his own that he’s not facing up to. Straithairn makes his work on stage seem effortless; we never get the sense of him as an actor practicing a craft, only of a character struggling with very human challenges and desires. Clegg plays the deluded Bailey with equal verisimilitude. His character (thanks to Dougherty’s brilliant script) makes us believe that a man can create an inner world that feels so true to him that what is actual reality can find no chink in Chester Bailey’s self-wrought armor.

Chester Bailey put me in mind of the wonderful mini-series by Dennis Potter, The Singing Detective, in which a man suffering from debilitating psoriasis retreats into a fantasy world.

Without spoiling the ending for you, I'll just say that sometimes delusion is the only cure for the perils of reality.

Chester Bailey plays through June 12 at ACT’s Strand Theater, 1127 Market Street, San Francisco. Tickets and more information are available at http://www.act-sf.org.