A child we cannot see is in danger. We hear the beeping of medical monitors. We hear his nurse say, with sudden sharpness, 'I don't like this.' We hear his mother's voice, threading through the noise, rising above it, as she tries to rouse him, asks him to stay with her.
The episode lasts mere minutes. It is entirely overheard, and I don't think I've ever felt such tension in a theatre beforeâa tension that ripples with the sudden, surprising twists of language and feeling distinctive of the playwright Amy Herzog.
The one-act play begins in a one-bedroom apartment in Queens, in which a single mother, Mary Jane (a superb Rachel McAdams), cares for her two-year-old son, Alex, who was born with serious medical conditions, including cerebral palsy.
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