Is a kiss ever just a kiss? Does every kiss have meaning? 

What’s in a Kiss?

Is a kiss ever just a kiss? Does every kiss have meaning? Can a kiss in the present be so charged that it propels the couple into a shared past so passionate and painful that all the time in between feels like a dream? What about funny kisses? Bizarre kisses? And most importantly for the show now at ICTC, what about stage kisses?

In the delicious backstage comedy by Sarah Ruhl, those questions are part and parcel of the very entertaining Stage Kiss. Ms. Ruhl has twice been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Her writing here is sharp, crisp, and very funny, with warmth and intelligence thrown in for good measure.

She and He meet in New Haven at the first rehearsal of a moldy old play twenty years after their affair abruptly ended. She is anxious about acting again after a hiatus of ten years, having married and raised her teenage daughter. He is a sculptor and itinerant actor living in a fleabag apartment in the East Village. They are both in shock when they meet at the first rehearsal, having no idea the other has been cast. They play former lovers in the overwrought production, and kiss almost 300 times. But it is the rehearsal kisses that ignite their passion and hurl them back to the heady days of their youthful liaison.

Stay for the Laughs

Tracie Lane, a member of Actors’ Equity in her first WNY appearance, is a bundle of nerves at her audition, talking incessantly, moving chairs an inch, dropping things, asking Director if she can do this or that. Her ambivalence is tangible as she is increasingly drawn to her former lover. Ms. Lane is a fine comic actor, whose facial expressions and delivery are perfectly timed for maximum laughs, and who later expresses the warmth and maturity her character developed over the years.

Guy Balotine is He. His great delivery of the riff on the difference between kissing and sex in theater and the movies, theatrical sex being less like masturbation, spotlights the high-quality Ms. Ruhl’s writing deserves. As the careless and in-your-face He, “I don’t find repression interesting”, Mr. Balotine is the quintessential kid in a candy store who wants all the treats and damn the consequences. One does not usually think that being on crutches is all that funny, but his bits with them certainly are.

Their scenes together run the gamut from the ridiculous to the sublime and both actors are very much in charge of their roles.

Love or Libido?

Greg Howze is the very enthusiastic yet also laissez faire Director, saying “try it” to anything the actors propose. He bounces around, moving actors here and there, and cajoles them into taking chances when they hesitate to engage. His sincere belief in the absurd and extremely violent play he has written makes his deadpan delivery of his monologue about it in the second act very comical.

Kevin Craig, Rolando Gomez, Marisa Caruso, and Christine Turturro each play more than one role. Mr. Gomez hams it up with panache as Harrison, She’s husband in the play. Then, tones it down when he plays her actual husband in Act 2. Kevin Craig is also over-the-top as the understudy lover and later the pimp. How he goes about kissing the horrified She is laugh-out-loud funny. Christine Turturro plays the daughter with conviction as a profanity-spewing, angry, wise beyond her years teenager. And Marisa Caruso is very effective as She’s bitchy friend and He’s kindergarten-teacher lover.

Fortunato Pezzimento directed this madness, assembling a fine diverse cast and creative team. He keeps up the comedic pace while allowing for more serious and tender moments to play out.

She asks He, “When I kissed you just now, did it feel like an actor kissing an actor or a person kissing a person? Because I’ve kissed you so many times over the last few weeks, I’m starting to not know the difference.”

Is it love between She and He, or have all those kisses just ignited their libidos and the desire to relive their shared past, when they were young and full of themselves and overwhelmed by their own passions?

You can find out at Irish Classical Theatre through April 24^th.