Orphans

Disturbing, poignant, and thought-provoking, Lyle Kessler’s drama Orphans follows the plight of two brothers: the emotionally volatile Treat and the sweetly naive Phillip, who were orphaned at an early age. Living hand to mouth in Philadelphia (the city of “brotherly love”), Treat supports them both by thieving on a daily basis. This tentative existence is interrupted by Harold, a middle-aged man whose sudden appearance propels the three men into a journey of self-discovery that irrevocably twists the status quo. There are no major revelations here, no coup de théâtre resolutions at the 11th hour, no obvious villains or heroes. And yet, with an insidiously pervasive tension, Kessler’s parable retains a strangely ambiguous clarity that slowly but surely sneaks in powerful emotional wallops with gentle, but nevertheless traumatic, force.