Houston Chronicle

I can scarcely contain my enthusiasm for Catastrophic Theatre’s ideally realized presentation of Mickle Maher’s delightfully original There Is a Happiness That Morning Is, so I’m not even going to try.

Director Jason Nodler introduced us to this Chicago playwright’s distinctive and virtually unclassifiable work with Catastrophic’s deft productions of The Strangerer and Spirits to Enforce in 2008.

Would Maher’s latest live up to the ingenuity of those witty, wacky, multilayered works?

Happiness, in the first mounting since its premiere at Chicago’s Theatre Oobleck earlier this year, surpasses them. If you prize imagination, intelligence and genuine passion, you’ll be on cloud nine through all 90 minutes of this utterly unpredictable experience.

Catastrophic Theatre’s Crave consists of four terrific actors in peak form, seated throughout in four chairs, speaking the remarkable lines of Sarah Kane, contemporary alternative theatre’s pre-eminent poet of despair, directed with illuminating brilliance by Jason Nodler. … The result is one of the most exciting theatrical events you’ll experience all year. No hype, flying effects or gazillion-dollar budget required. 

The four actors make each role distinctive and detailed, every line spontaneous and authentic. Boone radiates a forlorn grace and wry resignation. Carter combines biting wit and bitterness, anxiety and futile fury, to great effect. Greg Dean is a tower of burnt-out rage and desperation, intensity dissolving into ineffectuality. Johnson brings unique edge to her complex evocations of sarcasm, pain, despair and hysteria.

Nodler has outdone himself. His staging is a crash course in body language, getting maximum emotional impact from the subtlest tilt of the head or crossing of arms. Nodler has conducted this quartet for voices masterfully, perfectly calibrating its rhythms and dynamics into one long movement. You won’t believe the power Nodler and his actors generate with one virtuosic sequence of rapid-fire “Yeses” and “Nos,” followed by sequential, primal screams — constituting the play’s riveting climax. 

Quietly stunning ... Nodler and his Catastrophic team have done it again. They've taken a uniquely challenging, unsettling and multilayered piece of theatrical writing, put their stamp on it and brought it to life with intimacy, immediacy and a sense of urgency. ... each of these fine actors has never been better. .... The Designated Mourner is a must. 

Brownlie, the former frontman for Bring Back the Guns and making his acting debut, proves ideal as the young Johnston. The neediness and sensitivity, bouts of wild enthusiasm, panics of self-doubt — all spring naturally from his portrayal. It's a case of being, rather than acting the role.