Megan Hill in Open. Photo: Jeremy Varner

Open may be a play about a magician; it may be a play where, fair warning, members of the audience might be asked to “pick a card” or “place this scarf over this egg.” Yet there’s no actual sleight-of-hand, no clever props, no rigged cabinets, no doves or parrots flying out of hats. All the magic in Open is the magic inherent in theater itself: a group of people gathered in a room to suspend their disbelief together as we share a story crafted by writer Crystal Skillman and director Jessi D. Hill. There are lights, yes; there is sound, and, in the expert hands of Sarah Johnston and Emma Wilk, those will help to build the illusions we’re asked to imagine. There’s even a classic magician’s bedazzled tuxedo jacket (costumes by Madeline Wall). But this isn’t a play of spectacle; unlike a (strangely ever-increasing) number of other recent shows, there’s no “illusion consultant” in the program. 

All we have is story: Skillman’s words, spoken directly to the audience by Megan Hill. “Abracadabra,” she says, “means ‘as it is spoken.’…This magic show is a contract between you and I.” The Magician–Kristen–is a writer, or at least an aspiring writer working at a copy shop while finishing a YA fantasy novel about two young magicians in love. The story she’s telling us, though, is hers. 

Or really, the story she’s trying to avoid telling us. It’s perhaps overly literal to say that the whole play is a carefully calibrated exercise in magical thinking, but it’s also true, in more than one sense. On the one hand, it’s herself that Kristen is trying to misdirect, her own attention that she’s trying to focus on a bouquet of conjured flowers over here to avoid seeing the behind-the-scenes mechanics over there. On the other, there’s the bargaining dimension of magical thinking: If I complete this trick, I will change fate. If I tell this story the right way, I will force a different ending. I will be able to undo my own mistakes. And beside them both, there’s the exhortation to us, the audience, to join Kristen in pulling real miracles out of sound and shadow: in seeing the rings we can hear clanking, the parrot she conjures from her hat. We can fend off the horrors of the real world with those illusions–except that the sounds and lights of the world keep creeping back.

The love of Kristen’s life, Jenny, was brutally beaten and is fighting for her life in the hospital—and Kristen is paralyzed with indecision about going to see her, because she thinks Jenny’s family doesn’t want her there. Not because they disapprove of their daughter’s sexuality, as Kristen’s mother does, but because Kristen has always felt like Jenny’s family was suspicious of her, and now thinks they blame her for the assault. It’s a reaction of sharp, sad irony: Kristen was always the cautious one, the one constantly calibrating the contexts in which she felt safe being out, and Jenny the fierce advocate who resented Kristen’s inability to be fully open about their love. The fight they have the night of Jenny’s attack is rooted in that fear; it’s that fight that leads to Jenny being out late and alone when three mocking drunks assault her. 

We only get the story from Kristen’s perspective, of course; it’s a solo play, and she’s the storyteller. But Megan Hill, sharply directed by Jessi Hill, fills in just the right amount of vocal shading to sketch the other characters with both distinctness and honesty. Jenny comes off as a bit of a Pollyanna, a tireless optimist who believes the world is improving and paints her kitchen orange and red and peach. Kristen’s father is weak even in Kristen’s childhood memories, and a twist of the lips is all we need to get the measure of Kristen’s own mom. 

The magic that runs through the play has its place in the story as well as in metaphor: Jenny and Kristen meet-cute in the occult section of the Strand as Kristen does research for her book, and the shared interest bonds them. And the tricks form the structural spine of the piece, too, with the Magician whipping out a new act every time reality looms too close, every time she has to come to grips with her own fear. There are times, particularly in a tightrope-walking sequence, where the metaphors come so thick and fast they threaten to weigh down the narrative, but Hill’s performance is grounded enough in Kristen’s real emotions to keep it from foundering. Similarly, the reliance on the multiple meanings of “open”–opening your heart to love; opening the door to Jenny’s room; exhorting Jenny to open her eyes; the opening in the bookshelf through which Kristen and Jenny first glimpse each other, living openly queer–skates a very fine line between resonant and heavy-handed. 

But the thing about metaphor, about language games, about magical thinking is, none of them actually changes outcomes. You can’t bargain with the universe for better outcomes; the magic fails every time. Open lives in the space between the bitter knowledge that magic saves no one and the faith that the magic of art will see us through. At the risk of spoilers, Kristen’s efforts can’t heal Jenny; they can’t soften the brutality of the attack. The magic that Skillman, Hill, and Hill have created is to not let the play linger in that disillusionment. There is tragedy, but there is also healing; there is hope in storytelling and memory.