Friendship, and Then Some: The Fade-Away Advantage at the Provincetown Theater

There’s a certain power in laughing at something one fears, and Meryl Cohn takes full advantage of that impulse in The Fade-Away Advantage, now at the Provincetown Theater through October 20.

Jojo (Susan Lambert) and Michaela (D’Arcy Dersham) have a decades-long friendship that began when they met as wait staff at a clam bar in high school and featured one promise: if we’re both single by the time we’re fifty, we’ll move in together. So when Michaela summons Jojo to a weekend on Cape Cod, Jojo is sure she knows why; in fact, she’s come prepared to talk merging appliances.

On the surface, the women couldn’t be more different: Jojo is a free spirit ready to jump into anything, while Michaela is practical, restrained, reserved. Their characters are enhanced by Carol Sherry’s deft costuming, revealing in a glance the differences between Jojo’s flowing loose clothes and Michaela’s no-nonsense t-shirt, belt, and jeans.

As it turns out, Michaela wants to talk about something else—she has an unnamed neurodegenerative disease and plans at some point in the possibly not-so-distant future to end things on her own terms, and she wants Jojo’s commitment to be with her when she does. What ensues is a consideration of the meaning of life and death, the joys and pain of friendship, and the ways our decisions affect others.

So death is an integral part of the story, but it never evokes pathos: instead, oddly enough, this play is side-splittingly funny. The dialogue is snappy and clever and delivered with impeccable timing, and Cohn knows exactly when it’s time to move the audience’s emotional temperature.

Director Rebecca Berger has enabled the actors to take full advantage of the whole of Ellen Rousseau’s excellent stage set; there isn’t anything—door, prop, space—that isn’t used to full advantage, yet at the same time making their movements feel and seem completely natural.

That’s a word that kept coming to my mind: natural. The actors were all expressive and even occasionally dramatic, without their gestures or tone ever feeling trite or over the top. Lambert and Dersham have a connection that’s palpable and each inhabits her character with ease and skill.

The idyllic cottage setting (and mood) is regularly interrupted by two additional characters, landlady Baby Beretta (Janet Geist Moore) and her son Alfred (Nathaniel Hall Taylor). Baby is an almost slapstick addition and keeps scenes from becoming too serious, her slightly over-the-top persona dropped in with—again—perfect timing. On the other hand, it was unclear to me why Alfred was part of the play; his persona could have been completely off-stage with the same effect, and his only scene feels a little contrived and unnecessary.

But that’s one small criticism: this play is fantastically thought-provoking, entertaining, and a wonderful lens through which to think about what matters most in life—and death—to each of us.

review by Jeannette de Beauvoir

images by Bob Tucker/Focalpoint

The Fade-Away Advantage

At the Provincetown Theater through October 20.