"Constellations" at Cockroach Theatre has left me starry-eyed.

Tonight I was taken on a journey through the vast, infinite space of my emotional inner-life by a production so pure in form, intention and technique that I am left stunned as if for the first time by all that is possible by two people expressing themselves together on an empty stage. I am amazed by the playwright, Nick Payne, who managed to capture the essence of a musing mind in the structure of the story, with plot points firing off in all directions at the audience like synapses in the brain. The actors, Maythinee Washington and Erik Amblad, conjured the theatre’s magical power, empathy, with masterful skill offering expressions of need, love and loneliness so authentically that I had no choice but to surrender to the instinctive desire to comfort them. Their hopes and fears became my own, and together we discovered countless sparks and flickers of a wide array of emotions- a complete catharsis. Theatre at it’s finest is multidimensional poetry in motion, and like all great poems, this experience was energized by the tension that comes from overwhelming passions pressurized against a form of economy and restraint. It takes an exceptional director to sense the push and pull of this tension, and to trust it enough not to over-work it lest it lose it’s shape. Levi Fackrell directed an experience that was very much as thoughtful and passionate as I have seen him onstage as a performer, and as a person in daily life. My mind is swirling, like the play. I think I’ll just sit here for a minute and enjoy the feeling a little while longer. "Constellations" at Cockroach Theatre has left me starry-eyed. Thank you so much.