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By Charles Isherwood
(Excerpt)
"While he has yet to break through with a major play in New York, Mr. Wright, whose play, "Lady," had its world premiere at the Northlight Theatre in Skokie, has established himself as a productive for both the theater and television. He has written for the HBO series "Six Feet Under" and "Lost," and is now a co-executive producer on the ABC series "Brothers and Sisters."
At the same time, he has continued to produce plays with impressive regularity. "Lady" will be followed by another at the Humana Festival of New American Plays next montyh.
Set in a field on the outskirts of an Illinois town, "Lady" takes the political temperature of the American male several years into the Iraq war. Three old hunting buddies have gathered for their annual bonding weekend, each a neatly defined type meant to stand in for a slice of the masculine demographic.
As might be expected from a man whose computer must rarely get any time in sleep mode, Mr. Wright displays a facility in the tough mechanics of dialogue-writing. The voices in the play—of an outraged Bush hater, a congressman fervently waving the flag for the forceful spread of American values and a slacker type who would rather go to the movies—ring sharp and true. "Lady" is perceptive as a portrait of the testy dynamics of midlife male friendship.
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