I And You

Play (2014)
by Lauren Gunderson
Directed by Michelle M. Aguillon
Umbrella Arts Center
Concord, MA
October 11 – November 22, 2026

With Mei MacQuarrie (Caroline), Matthew Beagan (Anthony)

Caroline (Mei MacQuarrie) is at home in bed and is surprised to find that Anthony (Matthew Beagan), a high school classmate, has entered her room, bearing a tray of cookies. Apparently, Caroline’s mother has let Anthony in, given him cookies, and has told him to go upstairs to see Caroline. Animated banter between Caroline and Anthony ensues. It appears that Anthony has to complete a visual project on a Walt Whitman poem before the next day and asks Caroline for help.

Anthony’s request is very perplexing to Caroline, but she appears not to be unnerved by anything. With a quite fierce and annoyed rebuttal, Caroline tries to unwind Anthony’s seeming generosity and to irritate him, get under his skin. But Anthony is persistent and manages to get Caroline to listen to parts of the Whitman poem and she is taken with it. She agrees to help Anthony with his project and begins to undertake a cut and paste job which will help make his poster presentable.

In the course of things, it turns out that Caroline has to stay at home because she has a critical liver condition, and much of her repartee with Anthony has to do with what it’s like to have to live with death staring her down at every turn. As well, her parents have just separated, adding insult to injury. Sometime later, Anthony confesses that he too is suffering – he has just come from a basketball game at school where a fellow player has collapsed and died. Caroline is perplexed that Anthony would, after experiencing this traumatic event, have come to her house. But, indeed, things are quite a bit more complex than they appear. (See Spoilers section for more.)

There is a lot of sassy banter in this play, punctuated by a certain amount of heartfelt reflection on Walt Whitman. Whitman’s Song of Myself from Leaves of Grass provides a template for Anthony to engage and conversationally involve Caroline in a serious give and take. The poignancy of their interaction, and the laying down of her emotionally charged conversational defenses, form the texture of this drama. Playwright Gunderson manages, in a healthy display of teenage vernacular conversation, to infuse enough about the wonder of poetry to pull on a few heartstrings between her two main characters.

There is, throughout, a mystery about why Anthony has shown up at Caroline’s house. Why has he picked her to help him with his project? Is he attracted to her, or does he just feel sorry for her as a housebound patient? This perplexity seems to become less of an issue as the two get to know one another, but nothing really gets clarified until the very end.

The two actors do a fine job together. Mei MacQuarrie as Caroline is moody and snitty to perfection, but gradually releases other qualities adeptly. Matthew Beagan as Anthony is a teddy bear with composure and sincerity and bears the weight of the complex interaction with Caroline with adeptness and an appealing balance.

Suffice it to say that the ending provides significant surprises, and makes one wonder about what the preceding drama has accomplished. In many ways, the denouement is dramatic and moving, but it is not entirely clear how it has emerged from what has come before.

– BADMan (aka Charles Munitz)