Blasted

If Samuel Beckett had balls, he'd have written Blasted, a graphically offensive, utterly savage play about the deprecation (and depreciation) of human life, starting with something trivial as "mild" rape and moving into a full-on role-reversal (from a symbolic Enemy) and then to the darker stuff: not, "I can't go on, I'll go on," but "I can't go on, but there's no bullets left in my gun, I'm blind, and I can't find a way to kill myself."

I've got a lot more to say about this excellent production from Soho Rep, but know that Sarah Benson is a masterful director who manages to keep the brutal realism present even through the wicked symbolism at the end, and that all three members of the cast (especially Marin Ireland) are so palpably suffering through this play that you owe it to them to stand up and applaud (assuming you can find your footing after they floor you). They've set their aesthetic and dramatic standards ten times higher than in The Thugs: don't let my backlog of reviews keep you from getting tickets while the play gets extended!