We are Among Us
by Stephen Belber

When Beau, a directionless 19-year-old, discovers that his mother was involved in a decade-old unsolved crime during her time as a military contractor, he seeks out the Afghan victim's daughter in California.

As the web of the past widens, we see how a single, largely forgotten evening is still affecting people — and politics — throughout the country and world.

A play about how people move forward when the past refuses to fade.

"Rather than sensationally ripped from the headlines, the play's dilemmas grow organically.

And then there's a strong post-play half-life, leaving you debating your emotional allegiances.

Although figuring out what happened provides the machinery of the plot, WE ARE AMONG US isn't exactly a mystery.

It's more about figuring out its people, including the 'us' of the title.

Its half-life is vivid, like that of war, where figuring out the facts can't remotely relieve the pain … It's remarkable how this seemingly predictable small play becomes big and how quickly it forced me to invest in its three central characters.

This is even though (this is at the heart of the play's power) it's a zero-sum story where what we wish for each character complicates what we can wish for the others.

No, make that a negative-sum story in which each revelation further contracts the options.

We're forced into a pattern of tightening choices, just as the people the play dramatizes."

—Pittsburgh Post-Gazette