Off-B'way Review: What We Did Before Our Moth Days

Hope Davis, Josh Hamilton, Maria Dizzia,
and John Early in What We Did
Before Our Moth Days.
Credit: Julieta Cervantes

Wallace Shawn continues to explore themes of morality and familial influence with his latest work What We Did Before Our Moth Days, a series of interrelated monologues running three hours, yet mesmerizing us with its staggering details and insight into human behavior. The intense performances of a sharp quartet of actors and the sensitive, subtle direction of Shawn’s longtime collaborator Andre Gregory perfectly complement the playwright’s unsparing portrait of interpersonal dynamics.

As in his Aunt Dan and Lemon, The Fever, The Designated Mourner, and Evening at the Talk House, Shawn displays how morally careless actions can lead to devastating consequences a generation later. Aunt Dan’s unquestioning fascistic support of Henry Kissinger causes her niece Lemon’s bigoted, Nazi-like attitudes and emotionally stunted lifestyle. Fever and Mourner are cautionary tales against government oppression and overreach. In Evening at the Talk House casual acceptance of repugnant political practices inspires societal breakdown and the spread of torture. Moth Days focuses on personal conduct rather than political, but the choices the characters make still cause devastating consequences.

Josh Hamilton and Maria Dizzia in
What We Did Before Our Moth Days.
Credit: Luis Manuel Diaz

The central focus is on an affair conducted by novelist Dick (deceptively genial Josh Hamilton) with fellow writer and editor Elaine (brilliantly underplaying Hope Davis) and its effects on Dick’s long-suffering wife Elle (Maria Dizzia in a stunning portrayal of betrayal) and their psychologically damaged son Tim (John Early, captivatingly creepy). Shawn draws from his own experience. His father the famous New Yorker editor William Shawn carried on a long-term extramarital dalliance with New Yorker staff writer Lillian Ross which she exposed in a memoir after Shawn senior’s death. 

Hope Davis, Josh Hamilton, Maria Dizzia,
and John Early in What We Did
Before Our Moth Days.
Credit: Julieta Cervantes

The play begins with the adult Tim revealing a sordid hook-up and his father’s death occurring on the same night. After dropping off his temporary sexual partner, he returns to his parents’ home and admits Elaine to see his dad’s body with his mom standing by. (A similar scene is recounted in Ross’s book.) This leads to each of the four characters, seated in separate chairs and sipping mugs of tea, relating their backstories and individual version of events. Gradually, we learn Dick and Elle have grown apart as he pursues a successful writing career and she teaches difficult students in an inner-city high school. Dick is drawn to the more self-sufficient Elaine who appreciates a romance centered on pleasure with no emotional strings. 

We also learn that Dick’s hedonistic priorities lead to his son’s perverted sexual practices and the unfortunate fates of both father and son. The title refers to Dick’s sanitized vision of death which entails being carried away by the titular flying insects into the hereafter. Your moth day is your death day. The monologues seem to be the quartet’s rationalizing of their behavior from beyond the grave. There is only one sequence where two characters speak directly to each other. Late in the play, Tim meets with Elaine to get her perspective on his dad. They share a bottle of wine and their affinity for the sleazier side of life. 

Hope Davis and John Early in
What We Did Before Our Moth Days.
Credit: Luis Manuel Diaz

With novelistic detail, Shawn and Gregory weave a rich tapestry of interconnected stories. The running time is bit long and some of the threads could have been trimmed. But the cast keeps our attention. Josh Hamilton makes the narcissistic Dick charming and almost justifies his questionable life choices. Hope Davis is stingingly deadpan as the no-nonsense Elaine who has no illusions about love and prefers to live alone. John Early manages the seemingly impossible feat of making Tim relatable and repellant at the same time. He unreservedly exposes Tim’s darker side and the devastation which created it. Most impressive is Maria Dizzia as Elle, the self-sacrificing wife. She stunningly conveys the depths of Elle’s feelings of rejection and the wistful regret of meeting an attractive stranger but not acting on her impulse. We get the full range of Elle’s emotional life and her complex relationship with Dick and her son.

Andre Gregory’s carefully caliberated direction equally balances each character’s perspective and Jennifer Tipton’s sensitive lighting illuminates them appropriately. Riccardo Hernandez provided the tasteful, understated set and the subtly character-evoking costumes. 

March 5—May 24. Presented by Scott Rudin and Barry Diller at the Greenwich House Theater, 27 Barrow St., NYC. Running time: three hours including two intermissions. mothdays.com.