Having heard it is a comedy about three sisters in Mississippi, I was expecting a light-hearted romp like with the Futrelle sisters in “Dearly Beloved” and “Southern Hospitality.” What I discovered was something entirely different.
Under a thin veneer of black humor, this play is inhabited with very real characters. Three sisters, after their father’s abandonment and mother’s suicide, have been stumbling through life, each with her own individual dysfunction. They reunite after the youngest, aptly nicknamed “Babe,” a child’s mind within a woman’s body, shoots her husband because she “didn’t like the way he looked.” Despite years of resentment, jealously and estrangement, they band together against the outside world. With its sardonic wit and Kim Dobbs’ able direction, it tells this story without descending into maudlin melodrama.
If you are lucky enough to have sisters, grab them and go see “Crimes of the Heart.” The final shows are this week, with shows Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and a Sunday matinee at 2:30 p.m. at the JSU McClellan Theater.
Robin Bauer
Jacksonville
