"The Invisible Hand" at Marin Theatre Company

I've been looking forward to seeing "The Invisible Hand" since it was announced a year or more ago. We had seen Ayad Akhtar's "Disgraced" in New York earlier, and saw it again this season at Berkeley Rep. The writing is terrific, and he's tackling issues that seem really timely. So knowing nothing about this play, I really wanted to see it.

Quick Summary

As the name suggests, the play treats on economics and market forces, and chooses a rather unique point of entry to that. An American banker is kidnapped in Pakistan, held by a group of locals for a significant ransom. Unable to raise the amount they want, the banker contrives an idea to essentially teach his captors the techniques he uses in business to parlay the amount he has into the amount they want to set him free.

I have to say, this premise is a bit far-fetched, but once you buy into it, it's a pretty interesting setup, and it plays out well.

Once we get into the trading and arbitrage, we get to see some new aspects of all the characters, as ideals and pragmatism come smack up against greed, corruption, and suspicion. Eventually it all plays out more like a spy-vs-spy mystery-thriller, where everyone's motivations and actions come into question and no one knows who to trust.

Stuff I Liked

This category could go on a while. The writing is tight, and the acting is quite good. I was really looking forward to seeing Craig Marker as the banker after so recently seeing him in MTC's "Anne Boleyn" as two different English kings. Very different role here, obviously, but he handles it well. And Pomme Koch as one of the captors gives quite a good performance as a fluent English speaker (for reasons explained). All four actors were quite good.

And again, the set design was quite striking. Where so recently we'd been in English castles, the theater is here transformed into a tiny prison cell, somewhere in Pakistan. It's very effective as a small, cramped space. The cell itself becomes something of a character in the play. Nice design, well implemented.

Takeaways

One of the signs of a good play is that when you leave the theater, you're still thinking about and discussing the play and its issues, and in that regard, this one was strong: We discussed it all the way back to the East Bay. Topics ranged from religion to economics, to the plausibility of some of the "fundraising" techniques employed. In truth, most of the play seems a lot less plausible when examined afterward, but the fact that it kept us all pretty much enthralled during the show suggests that it is effective, and the weaknesses we discussed later were not serious flaws in the play.

I was impressed with how well Akhtar kept us all guessing about where allegiances really lay, both by having it a topic of dialogue in the play and by having characters betray their words. Although I was fairly certain from the outset what the ultimate outcome for the captive would be, the play kept me interested and reexamining my views throughout.

In short, a good play, well produced and acted. Can't ask for much more than that out of an evening at the theater.