Caryl Churchill's Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?, now getting its U.S. premiere at the Public Theatre under James Macdonald's resourceful direction, runs only 45 minutes, but it's somewhere between 15 and 20 minutes too long. This first tantalizing -- and then amusing and disturbing -- dark comedy-sketch all too quickly becomes predictable and repetitive.

Churchill, whose mind habitually and irresistibly runs to cryptic theatrical puzzles, has come up with yet another -- and one that's difficult to write about without peppering spoilers throughout a review. As the lights go up, an American, Sam (Scott Cohen), and an Englishman, Guy (Samuel West), sit on a couch. If that sounds like the b[...]