Neil Labute’s “Some Girl(s),” staged in the intimate Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater of the Geffen Playhouse, transports the audience to the interior of various hotel rooms across the country to meet Guy (Mark Feuerstein), a full-time writer and heartbreaker. Guy’s reunions with four past lovers at these hotels prove a largely unsettling experience, even with the play’s constant interjections of humor.
Despite his name, Guy is no typical man, but rather a chronic womanizer who has left pain in the wake of all his relationships. Preparing, however, to marry the supposed woman of his dreams, he decides to meet his past girlfriends to make sure there are no hard feelings.
Guy first appears awkward enough onstage, getting ready for his first meeting by messing with the TV remote, compulsively munching on cashews and putting on foreign music to appear more intellectual.
At first glance, he seems just as nervous to see the women, but he has left searing memories of betrayal with each girlfriend. The chemistry between Guy and the four ex-girlfriends he visits are entirely different but effective throughout.
He first meets with high school sweetheart Sam (Paula Cale Lisbe), whom he cheated on at prom. Lisbe’s defensive and uncomfortable demeanor immediately induces sympathy as Sam endures a barrage of subtle insults, with Guy telling her that he left her because he saw himself working at a grocery store if he ever married her.
Despite the pain of moments like this one, the women and Guy often manage to insert humor into the act, as Sam recounts learning about his infidelity at the prom next to the Fudgsicles at the local store. She tells him, “I don’t need a name. Just tell me what page she’s on,” so she can look up the woman in an old high school yearbook.
Even though many of the relationships occurred years ago, the past comes charging forward as each woman unleashes her long-held anger toward Guy, whether discussing her loss of virginity or being cheated on.
Sam and Guy’s awkward meeting is juxtaposed with Guy’s meeting with a second girlfriend, Tyler (Justina Machado), who has a laid-back, flirty demeanor, casually lounging around the hotel, lighting up cigarettes and downing liquor. But even her easy mood soon falters when Guy reflects back on their relationship and Tyler learns that his mind was set on another woman throughout their time together.
She fails to understand his hotel room sojourns, asking, “What are you looking for?” which becomes the important question as more sinister motives reveal themselves to be at work with Guy.
The third lover Guy encounters, Lindsay (Rosalind Chao), brings a charge to the stage as an articulate and sophisticated college professor who has a serious bone to pick with Guy. It was refreshing to see Guy finally being called out for his past behavior as Lindsay asserts, “Hurt is your number one by-product.” The situation’s escalation, though, which involves a blindfold and stripping, becomes a bit too over the top and absurd, with no clear effect on the play’s progression.
Each scene with a different woman is intercut with Rolling Stones music as flashing lights pound out a song matching the emotions of the particular part of the play. Stage hands act as maid service, setting up the next scene by rearranging the furniture. Each hotel room is altered into one just as impersonal as the last, in which Guy will again tear at a past girlfriend’s heart.
The musical transition to the fourth and final ex-girlfriend is “Paint it Black,” fitting since the play slowly grows darker despite the continuing moments of humor. Graduate student Bobbi (Jaime Ray Newman) finally reaches Guy’s conscience, calling him an “emotional terrorist” in a fight that becomes the climax of the play. Although the play needs this conflict, the scene drags on a bit too long, with Bobbi attempting to leave and coming back about three times too many.
The finale is a heated one with a believable surprise that satisfies that ever-present question of why exactly Guy is meeting with his past flames. The play’s last song, “Sympathy for the Devil,” ends the play’s tumultuous ride but left me wondering if the audience is really expected to offer up compassion for this devil. The play sparked a lot of emotions, but sympathy for Guy’s heartless ways wasn’t one of them.
““ Laura Picklesimer
E-mail Picklesimer at lpicklesimer@media.ucla.edu.