photo by Carol Rosegg
Mahida (Mariam Habib) begs her brother (Ryan Shams) not to hurt Thomas (Jack Moran) Mahida’s Extra Key To Heaven at Playwrights Theatre
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You head out on a cold and beautiful evening for your customary walk, fleeing the house of your loving yet opinionated mother, Edna by name. You go to your favorite spot, the deserted ferry dock. As you draw closer, you notice that this evening the dock is not deserted.

The young woman looks confused and slightly worried, thrumming with tension but not yet expressing her anxiety. Thus begins a long day's journey into what? The questions and the answers are found within Russell Davis' "Mahida's Extra Key to Heaven," at Playwrights Theatre, in Madison, New Jersey, through May 9.

Mariam Habib, whose surname means "beloved" in Arabic, portrays Mahida. Mahida, however, is not feeling beloved by her brother, Ramin, who has disappeared without explanation. He came to the United States from Iran to bring his sister home from her literature studies and they have had a disagreement. Has he gotten into some sort of trouble? Has he stranded her there to teach her a lesson? Either way, when Thomas finds Mahida, she's got a lot to mull over.

Jack Moran, who was the young, ne'er do well brother in Playwrights' "Grapes of Wrath," plays Thomas, and explores a different aspect of the psyche as the artist and painter, who discovers this woman in distress. You can see that she intrigues him, especially when she won't have anything to do with him. But as he brings her around out of her world and into the one they are sharing at the moment, the energy is tentative and deep at the same time. Thomas heart opens to this damsel and, while we can see him balancing Mahida's unspoken need for assistance with whether or not he should bring her to the house, where he's visiting his mother, he makes the right decision and makes her a place on the couch. He gives us a bit of foreshadowing in explaining what his mother is likely to say and how it should be countered.

When we meet Edna-Jane Blass in a chewy, gritty, sometimes cartoonish role-she is every liberal's boogie (wo)man conservative. She is a wee bit flighty, or ephemeral if you're kind, and she is constantly fiddling with her environment to make it orderly. She has a view of her son as "surly," yet when she has an opportunity for an epiphany during a conversation with another stranger, her course is suddenly changed.

Ryan Shams plays Mahida's brother, Ramin, who comes to retrieve her the next day. His encounters with Edna show us several bits of his character. While he's a grown man, who sits erect in a hard chair, never touching the back of it, he has the character of a young boy, enduring a time out. There is a great deal of mother/son interchange, even though they are not related. They are each conservatives of their own stripe, each sparring with the other in a manner that is both convincing and showing awareness of the clash of titanic thought paths, not just ideas. Each points out the flaws in the other's arguments and, as sometimes happens when there are no cooler heads to prevail, tragedy occurs.
Women and men, men and women: there are clashes along gender lines, as well as about seniority and respect for elders and youngers, and siblings for one another. Each character has at least one epiphany of his or her own, and Thomas and Mahida each have more. Russell Davis has written a play of great ideas, and great length. John Pietrowski directs this effort, as well as serving as artistic director of the company. Pietrowski is not afraid to show big ideas against the spare background, which displays them starkly and well. See this play, talk back to the show, and talk about the show, and know what it means to understand your place in the world-and how your place, and my place, and all people's places swirl and change and add depth to our story.

The final show of Playwrights Theatre's 2009-2010 season, "Mahida's Extra Key to Heaven," by Russell Davis, opened on April 22 and runs through May 9. It is every bit as thought provoking as the earlier offerings of the season and offers both laughter and philosophical pause. Single tickets are on sale now for $15. Student-appropriate for ages 13 and up-and senior matinees are scheduled for Wednesdays, April 28 and May 5 at 10:30 a.m., and Ladies Night at the Playwrights Theatre will be on Thursday, April 29, beginning at 5 p.m., with curtain at 6:30 p.m. For tickets, visit www.ptnj.org or call the box office at 973/514-1787 X10. Performances take place at Playwrights Theatre, 33 Green Village Road in Madison.