Our Late Night at Catastrophic Theatre is One Mad Bad Over-the-Top From-the-Gut Laugh Bash

Wallace Shawn wrote his boldly intense and dense one act, Our Late Night, in 1972 under the direction of his friend Andre Gregory.

The rehearsal period lasted three years.

In 1975, it finally debuted and successfully offended many people but, in spite of itself, won an Obie Award.

Catastrophic's production of Our Late Night is only the fourth professional production of the play in the past thirty-five years!

Jason Nodler, co-artistic director of Catastrophic Theatre and director of Our Late Night, has chosen the perfect play to fulfill the mission of Catastrophic Theatre---to produce bold, experimental, aesthetically pleasing works that encompass a fiercely independent spirit.

Run!---don't walk!---to see Our Late Night!

I predict this play and, specifically, Catastrophic's brilliant production of it to be THE major cult hit of this year's theatre season.

I am reminded of Yazmina Reza's witty and brutal dialogue she creates in God of Carnage, where an ordinary situation sparks extraordinary and unexpected actions.

What is Our Late Night about?

It's a party!

What is a party about?

Loose ends of conversation.

Loose lips.

Getting looped.

And who knows what else?

Specifically, Shawn's play explores sexuality every which way.

Shawn says: "Well ... uh. The, uh, ordinary way we modern Western people tend to think of ourselves, um ... uh, doesn't really ... um, uhh ... take account of, uh, sex. That makes sex very interesting as a subject."

So you can expect lots of nasty conversation and racy action in Our Late Night.

This is part of what makes the play so hilariously amusing.

We simply do not know where anything is leading---if anywhere.

And that is precisely what is so enticing an intriguing about Our Late Night.

Our Late Night moves us with its remarkable sense of spontaneity, unknowing, and unpredictability.

All at once, the play is:

Impressionistic.

Expressionistic.

Surreal.

Real.

Weird.

Trippy.

Nasty.

Trashy.

Literate.

Literal.

Insane.

Figurative.

Sexual.

Mysterious.

Neurotic.

Hilarious.

Sad.

Honest.

Deceitful.

Superfluous.

Deep.

Dated.

Timeless.

Whatever description I seem to come up with, the opposite and everything in between also applies!

That's why Our Late Night is so delightfully deliciously disgustingly divine!

The moment we filter into Catastrophic's performance space at DiverseWorks, we know we are in for a fabulously wild and crazy ride.

Greg Dean's huge and handsome set of the high-rise New York apartment where the party happens is superbly stunning.

Perhaps four feet off the floor and running the entire length of the theatre, Dean's beautifully stylized set draws us in through its huge picture windows that look out onto the world far below.

Two huge exquisite canvasses by Howard Sherman are mounted on the upstage wall flanking a huge modular beige sofa.

Jason Nodler has so perfectly cast his actors that we imagine that these are actual people at an actual party.

His inventive direction has us looking, watching, and scanning the entire stage often because we are afraid we might miss something if our eyes stop moving.

Greg Dean is sexy, mysterious, and intriguing as Lewis, who is hosting the soiree.

Dean's last performance on a Houston stage was as Davies in Stagger Lee's production of Pinter's The Caretaker, where he was bald with a goatee.

Here, Dean has hair on his head but not on his face.

His extreme versatility and broad range as an actor are amazing.

Mikelle Johnson is stunning and captivating as Anette, Lewis' partner.

Dean and Johnson, as Lewis and Anette, begin the play alone in their apartment before the party and end the play after the party.

Cryptic and enigmatic describes their dialogue.

We may never understand what we hear and that is precisely the point.

Nodler ends the play with a series of snapshots of this peculiar couple living out their mysterious lives before our very eyes.

The effect is hauntingly and indescribably wicked.

Carolyn Houston Boone portrays Samantha with enough passion, paranoia, and pornography that we are always anxiously anticipating her next strange move.

Jeff Miller as Grant is all at once intelligent and idiotic with his strange and off-color remarks.

Karina Pal Montano-Bowers as Kristin is the sexiest, horniest, and hottest character to come along in quite awhile.

Her constant teasing and torturing of the men at the party winds the audience up with hysterical laughter.

Kyle Sturdivant as Tony wins the funniest monologue of the year contest with his outrageous retelling of a recent trip to the tropics which gave him a seemingly everlasting boner.

His delivery will delight and disgust you as you laugh your ass off.

He is a silly sight to behold as he collapses onto the sofa with a mysterious illness.

Troy Schulze as Jim is the perfect straight man for every character who ends up spilling their guts to him.

His deadpan expressions are priceless and matchless.

Lighting design by Kirk Markley is multi-layered, complex, and stunning as he brilliantly illuminates every square inch of the stage and creates mood and interest with the slightest and subtlest lighting effects, always aware of shadow and light playing upon our senses which he stimulates to the max.

Costume design by Kelly Robertson is excellent.

Sound design by Andrew Harper is amazing.

The entire play is underscored with a variety of excellent choices of music, which enhance and support the madness of each moment of Our Late Night.

Get thy ass to Catastrophic Theatre at DiverseWorks as soon as possible to experience this quirky, queer, quixotic, quizzical masterpiece of modern theatre.

Our Late Night runs Wednesdays through Saturdays through Saturday, April 3, at 8 p.m. at DiverseWorks.

BTW, all performances are pay-what-you-wish!