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Spending time with stock traders is usually about as enticing as a terrorist jail cell. But somehow director Allen Nause makes both captivating in Pulitzer Prize-winner Ayad Akhtar's The Invisible Hand, staged by Artists Repertory Theatre and Seattle's ACT company. Akhtar named his play for an economic theory, Adam Smith's idea that selfishness ironically fuels overall good. But the production avoids mind-numbing number games with a provocative plot line that tries to go beyond New York Times headlines.
Nick Bright (Connor Toms), an American futures trader captured by Islamic militants in Pakistan, attempts to grow a nest egg of $3 million to pay off his own $10 million ransom by playing the market. As Bright and his captor, Bashir (Imran Sheikh), grow close during his confinement, Akhtar's play waxes more emotional than political. "Portraying Bashir as human is my first priority," Sheikh said. "That humanity is the most important and the trickiest."
Nause, who just passed the baton of artistic director at Artists Rep to L.A. transplant Dámaso Rodriguez, had a personal agenda when casting. In Islamabad with Arts America, he directed Pakistani actors and then tried to fly them back to Portland for the sake of international collaboration, but also authenticity. The U.S. State Department did not approve, denying the actors' work visas.
But nothing seems inauthentic onstage. Portlanders Sheikh and John San Nicolas join Toms and William Ontiveros, two of the original actors from Nause's Seattle staging with ACT. Nause said the lead from his Pakistani The Odd Couple was disappointed, "but he let go and said this was how it's meant to be." Serendipitously, Portland's new Bashir (Sheikh) is Pakistani-born.
Defying his religious morals, Bashir gets greedy with the adrenaline rush and cash flow from trading stocks. Within a few scenes, nightfall and infighting darken the set, the imam's eye for expensive real estate and off-shore accounts threatening Bright's hope of liberty or life.
The play's few faults are less fatal. Bashir's transformation from violent guard to almost jovial counterpart feels fast; he overturns Bright's metal bed on first appearance, but at the first signs of monetary success he's lounging on it, tossing off his desert skullcap. And between scenes, timestamps projected onstage in typewriter font read "two days later," "that night," etc. This attempt at clarity instead feels more kitschy, like Law & Order's "dun-dun" would sound. Even with its suspenseful setup, the first half sometimes drags through stocks-for-dummies scenes. Then, before your intermission pinot has time to settle, Bashir and Bright are holding hands for the final bow.
But Toms on his knees, grasping at air with a silent scream, is believable, not melodramatic. And the entire cast follows suit; the white-bearded imam serenely threatens Bright's life while thumbing prayer beads. The set captures audiences, too. Constructed like a birds-eye-view jail cell, it sucks us into its claustrophobic shell.
Bright, between bouts of jerking off to Archie
comics, works relentlessly for his freedom. Bashir claws his way up the
militant hierarchy. And the imam shops for an opulent new home. Just as
in the play's namesake theory, each character only cares for himself.
But thanks to a strong staging from Artists Rep, we care too.
SEE IT: The Invisible Hand is at Artists Repertory Theatre, 1515 SW Alder St., 241-1278. 7:30 pm Wednesdays-Sundays and 2 pm Sundays through April 5. $25-$49.
WWeek 2015