The Oddest of Couples: Meny Beriri Brings Two Witty and Insightful Character Studies to the ATA

Opposites may attract, but they also repel pretty quickly too, as Meny Beriri observes in his two new one-act pieces, Smoking Kills and SKU. They complement each other perfectly as each is a look at two sets of people struggling to get on the same page. Each pairing features one cynic, and one hopeless romantic; one cautious, and the other free-spirited; one level-headed, and the other obsessive; one grounded in reality, and the other in Hallmark movie-land. Both plays take place in a post-pandemic world, which informs the approaches to life of all the characters—it’s basically “Let’s Form a Connection” vs. “Leave Me Be.”

SKU: “We’ll always have Paris Baguette!”

Alex (Gordon Rothman) and Melanie (Stacey Petricha) are fresh from their memorable date at the aforementioned bakery/café, and are now meeting at a restaurant to keep the fire burning over Indian food. Melanie is a retired nurse, and happy to be independent and free of responsibility. “We’re not heroes,” dismisses Melanie, who sees her nursing career as having been just a stressful gig. Alex, in contrast, is a high-school social studies teacher so in love with his job that he has convinced himself that every day is as meaningful as Dead Poets Society. He’s a passionate soul who fixates on something and won’t let it go; he’s an hour late to the second date, blaming it on his obsession over obtaining a certain stapler missing the SKU of the title. (It stands for “Stock Keeping Unit”, which stores use to identify products in their inventory.) He then goes on a tangent about Star Trek (The episode “The Doomsday Machine,” to be appropriately specific), and his quest to discover the identity of the actor who walked in front of Kirk in one pivotal scene. Melanie is life-loving as well, but in a fiercely independent way. She doesn’t see constant companionship as the key to happiness—to her, it’s by and large an obstacle.

“You still need other people,” argues Alex. “But you can’t depend on them for happiness!” Melanie fires back.

She stays polite, but her demeanor begins to indicate that the Paris Baguette encounter should maybe have been a one-and-done. Alex, however, has decided after one date and a half that Melanie is his soul mate.

“You think we share a soul?” she scoffs. “From what I remember, that’s not how reincarnation works!” But Alex is unrelenting—he announces he wants to travel the world with the sudden love of his life, and Melanie recoils in horror; to her, that basically echoes the title of the very first episode of Star Trek: “The Cage”.

While perfectly depicting the clashing of their characters, the actors have tremendous chemistry and make the script sing. Petricha and Rothman are supported by Samiha Ahmed, the waitress who has a god’s eye-view of the quickly crumbling romance. Though things go south fast for Alex and Melanie’s connection, they do so humorously, and the theme of incompatibility lands while never feeling tragic or even at all downbeat; Alex lands on his passionate feet, in a very funny resolution.

Smoking Kills opens to the sounds of the Odd Couple theme, lampshading the relationship between the youthful and exuberant Emily (Julianne Lorndale) and her roommate/landlord, the older, warier Jane (Leia Martin).

An Oklahoma transplant, Emily returns to their NYC apartment gushing over her date with “Harold”, who took her to the exotic Avenue D and then on a romantic trip on the Staten Island Ferry. Emily compares it to Casablanca, which she recently discovered. Jean smells cigarettes on Emily—the extremely potent Marlboro Reds, to be exact—and is disgusted. Emily admits she smoked one of Harold’s ciggies in the heat of the moment, and still has the pack. Jean is triggered due to the 6-pack a day habit she once had as a teen, and warns Emily of the evils of the addiction, and of a lot of other dangers in life that Emily seems blissfully unaware of—such as the antibiotic filled Jumbo Shrimp she consumed at dinner. Jean invokes the “my house, my rules” clause, escalating the confrontation between the two, and leading to an explosive, violent-but-comical climax. As with SKU, a potentially traumatic conclusion is handled humorously, and again with the perfect final moment. Martin and Lorndale realize this modern-day Felix and Oscar beautifully, playing off each other with deftness and expertly serving the witty material.

These two delightful one-acts are a testament to Beriri’s ability to take the sad reality of the failed connections that plague life in the post-pandemic 2020s, and imbue them with a compassionate touch and knowing sense of humor that is refreshing, and somehow even healing.

SKU is directed by Meny Beriro; Smoking Kills is directed by Ginger Kipps. They are featured together at the American Theatre of Actors through December 8, 2024.