The world premiere of “Do Something Pretty” at Rivendell Theatre Ensemble feels like the Chicago storefront version of classic ’80s teen movies like “Sixteen Candles,” “Pretty in Pink” and “Say Anything,” and that’s very much a compliment. Playwright Melissa Ross’ story may be standard, but her dimensional characters capture authentic teenage awkwardness and angst, and the central performances, especially in this intimate venue, make you ache for them.
Ross sets the play in the summer of 1992 outside of Boston, so in addition to the John Hughes influences, there’s a hint of the purposeful lethargy and grunge of “Slacker” and the Gen X disaffection of “Reality Bites.” Period details are lovingly expressed in the set and props design, down to the retro Doritos bag and the specific VHS tapes piled up by the downstage TV, including “Breakfast Club,” of course.
Nearly 14-year-old, soon-to-enter high school Phoebe (Katherine Mallen Kupferer) lives with her always-away mother and caring 18-year-old half-sister Evie (Jocelyn Zamudio), who is about to go off to college.
For the extended first scene, Phoebe hangs with 19-year-old Jason (Reilly Oh) as he waits for Evie to come home. It doesn’t take long to realize that he is, and has always been, desperately in unrequited love with Evie. She will eventually return only to head right out on a date with college student Matt (Jasper Johnson), the type of guy’s guy who, according to Jason, he and Evie “useta make fun of.”
That, and the rest of its playing out, captures most of the actual plot in what is very much a character-driven work. And the truth is that “Do Something Pretty” feels most full of life when nothing much is happening at all. Ross’ dialogue has a natural, even graceful and clever reality to it, but under Jessica Fisch’s deeply detailed direction, it’s the silences that matter most, especially whenever those silences ripen between Oh’s Jason and Mallen Kupferer’s Phoebe. She both feels sorry for him and harbors a confusing adolescent attraction; he assures her she’ll have any guy she wants in high school and tries not to look at her for too long at a time.
Mallen Kupferer is making her debut at Rivendell with this show, which is a bit surprising given that she’s the daughter of founding members Tara Mallen and Keith Kupferer, with whom she memorably starred in the festival-favorite film “Ghostlight.” She’s phenomenal here and reason enough to see the show. It’s the type of performance that draws you honestly and deeply into her character, who sits so exactly at the edge of childhood innocence and adolescent need.
Oh, coming off a strong performance in Lookingglass’ “White Rooster,” cements himself as someone to watch closely. He is onstage the entire play, which takes place over two real-time acts, set over one night and the next early morning. Over time, Oh exposes Jason’s burdened inner life. His mother is sick with an uncertain prognosis, and he has two younger brothers. We’re, purposefully, never quite sure whether he repeated his senior year because of family distractions or because he wanted to make sure he saw Evie every day in school. He’s in a neverland between teenage-dom and adulthood, and Oh manages to make Jason likable without compromising how pathetic he is.
The biggest weakness with Ross’ play is that, structurally, it’s about Jason, when we really want more of Phoebe and Evie. The play could be so much richer if there were scenes directly between the sisters.
Zamudio, who showed us an equally believable working-class teenager from a totally different perspective (an undocumented immigrant) in Steppenwolf’s “Sanctuary City,” convinces us fully of Evie’s desperation to start a new life away from home and her deep love for her younger sister. Her complicated relationship with Jason digs deeply into what happens when one friend kept growing and the other got stuck, but it doesn’t feel fully convincing, perhaps a reason why Ross keeps having the characters try to explain it.
Johnson brings a careful calibration to the supporting character Matt, keeping us from over-judging the superficially obnoxious bro figure, whose primary purpose seems to be to show us Evie’s insecure sense of self, as well as to expose Jason’s self-delusions.
This is not the kind of audience-tested popular work like the aspirational teen movies it so clearly alludes to. It’s complicated and messy and never fully resolved. But the characters, and certainly the acting, have the same type of openhearted vulnerability that made them mean so much to the people who grew up with them.