MUST SEE: Dad Don't Read This lives up to the hype

Are you writing a play? Or playing The Sims?

Ulises Ramiro

There's a genocide happening in Sudan. Being gay in Saudi Arabia is punishable by death. 90% of people in Syria live below the poverty line. The list of horrible things going on in the world goes on and on and on. So why the hell do I care about four high school girls hanging out in their parent's basement in the suburbs playing The Sims?

Eliya Smith's Dad Don't Read This takes a setting and premise likened to that of a 90's slumber party movie and turns it on its head, providing audiences not just a respite from the world's atrocities, but also with characters, writing and storytelling so human that the show holds you in close and keeps you riveted.

The cast of Dad Don't Read This is lovely, delivering Smith's colorful, textural rants with ease. It's these rants that show off Smith in a very particular way. Her instincts as a writer are top-tier, not just in the movement and direction of the single line or the specific monologue, but such is represented in the overall movement of this great play.

Director Chloe Claudel's talents are put on display here as well, using the space and piece for visual sections that divert expectation and provide an interesting overall pace.

There are certain moments in the play that crackle. There's one story in particular, somewhat early on after quite a bit of fun and games, that we learn about an awkward encounter that has blisteringly sinister undertones. The subtlety of the noise upstairs fits in line here, combining with a sexual thread that digs below the light, colorful, humorous surface of this play.

The moments of real fighting banter between characters are nicely constructed and do bring the audience in closer, but sometimes the play felt a bit locked into the idea that, you're not a good friend and I want you to be a better one. The play uses this idea in many interesting ways, but sometimes this idea falls a touch flat.

Dad Don't Read This creates characters that are so human that it asserts itself as a rare and great piece. It's quite funny, heartfelt, honest and real.

You'll leave the theater thinking, “we need more plays like this.”