Today's theatergoers may be forgiven if they're a bit fuzzy on the thrust of David Rabe's 1976 play, Streamers, since it hasn't had a major revival since winning a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding New Play. Thanks to a crack director, Scott Ellis, and a sizzling cast, the Roundabout Theatre's first-rate rendition -- being produced in association with Boston's Huntington Theatre, where it ran last season -- makes you wonder why this play took so long to claim a major marquee.

Although it's the third entry in Rabe's Vietnam-themed triptych of early works -- it was preceded by 1971's The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel and 1972's Sticks and Bones -- Streamers, which is set in 1965, does not ap[...]