[Now Playing] Sex With Strangers

“And the talking leads to touching / And the touching leads to sex / And then there is no mystery left.” –Rilo Kiley, Portions for Foxes

In spite of the abstinence-wagging of mothers and the divulging bravado of libertine friends, many truths about sex with strangers go unsaid: that moments after meeting someone, you can feel you’ve arrived — unexpectedly — in a deeply familiar place; that economic transactions can overwhelm even the most casual of connections; that your unique fears, anxieties, and insecurities don’t truly disappear in the thrill of a foreign encounter (and may rear their head midway through!).

All of these dynamics show up in FWB or committed relationships, but we don’t often expect them in casual encounters. What do we expect? Detachment? A muting of expectations and feeling, a merely physical exchange, or, as in Rilo Kiley’s plaint, an emptying of mystery? Small square portraits become text messages become addresses become bodies become, suddenly, skin, and part of the allure that follows is bound up in the risk that all of it could end very, very badly.

Laura Eason’s Sex with Strangers, expertly directed by Christy Montour-Larson and premiering regionally at Curious Theatre Company, explores these tensions and erotics. High-school teacher Olivia, played by Paige Price, is diligently working on her second novel in a writer’s cabin during winter break when Ethan, played by Michael Kingsbaker, stumbles in from the snow. Ethan proudly announces his credentials as a blog author in the vein of pick-up genre such as The Game, who recorded his weekly sexual exploits for a year. He also clarifies how much he admires Olivia’s literary first novel, which fizzled several years back. Olivia’s initially distrusts Ethan, but snowed in and alone in an intimate library, an exquisite set designed by Susan Crabtree, seduction seems inevitable.

The stakes rise when Olivia’s publishing ambitions and Ethan’s crossover literary ambitions get tangled up, and the mutual interests that initially brought them together threaten to unravel them professionally and personally. Eason, who has written for Netflix’s House of Cards as well as dozens of other plays, pulls off some marvelous banter and betrayal, so that it’s unsurprising why Sex with Strangers is one of the 10 most-produced plays this season. (Eason, it should be noted, is a Denver native and graduate of Cherry Creek High School). Price and Kingsbaker carry the two-person show with believable passion and arresting vulnerability, as their characters try to determine if their connection is more of an exchange or a relationship.

Though some of the musical transitions seem distracting, what really works in this production is Shannon McKinney’s lighting, which tracks the character’s embrace of electronic publishing, warm incandescent mini-lamps on bookshelves gradually giving way to the blue glow of digital reader screens. And not only do Kevin Brainerd’s costumes reflect Ethan’s headlong and Olivia’s literary sensibilities, they also come off easily, multiple times—essential in delivering the title’s promise.

Sex with Strangers runs at Curious Theatre Company until February 20, with Girls Night Out on February 10 “with a little extra sizzle.”