The plot thickens

From the moment the lights went up and "Louie's at 1st and Main" began I was questioning the show. It is always hard to be sitting in a show that you have never heard of and have positive expectations. Just hearing the name of the theatre was enough to get me skeptical. As the show started, a seemingly slow start at that, I began jotting down notes. A few things impressed me from the get go. Dimitri, the homeless man and his friend Louie exchanged witty banter throughout the entire show. At one point they were discussing bread as though it were a fine Merlot. They comparisons they came up with were witty and added a nice flavor to the dialogue. While I was not able to pick up on it at the time, this show had a great deal of foreshadowing in it. From little things like Dimitri feeding Louie bread or crackers, to more obvious lines like Dimitri asking why Louie never talked while others were around, the foreshadowing was subtle and clever.
The crazy cat lady, Tessie, had brilliant lines. The playwright certainly did a number with creating that role! She would mutter and sputter about who knows what and work herself into a frenzy over Aztecs and space ships and talking to her kitties that were never to be seen. Tessie also gave a bit of foreshadowing by telling Dimitri that there are angles everywhere. while he wrote it off to be one of her crazy rants, it ended up being very true and personal to him when the "smart girl" ended up being his angle taking him to heaven.
Certain parts of the script stuck out like a sore thumb to me. Scene lengths dragged on somewhat pointlessly, especially when it came to Dimitri explaining to Sgt. Tracy about his experience with teaching and how he ended up on the streets. I feel like that whole scene lacked some much needed editing in order to pick up the pace and make it easier for the audience to stay captivated. Another thing that really stuck out was the constant mention of "this city". I continuously wondered through the entire show where it was set and paid close attention to hear a name, yet never got an answer.
The one part of the script that I really appreciated was how the "bum" could talk circles around the "educated" people and make comments that would fly right over their heads. It really goes to show that you can never stereotype people based on what you think they are like. You never know what kind of life they have lived and what circumstances led them to this point. The successful businessman may have just inherited the business from daddy, the seemingly poor couple may just be using their money for more important things in life than shiny cars, and the homeless man you pass every morning may indeed once have been a respected professor at a university whose life took an unexpected turn for the worse.