'A Play by Barb and Carl' lifts the spirit and moves the soul

Sometimes a show is so moving that it leaves one immobilized well after the lights come up. Wait for the body and spirit, which have become separated in flight, to come back together again and land, softly. Let the last bits of inspiration fall onto you. Breathe.

Such feelings follow "A Play by Barb and Carl," Carlyle Brown's power-packed, 80-minute one-act about a couple's enduring love after one partner suffers a stroke. In this autobiographical drama, now up in a premiere at the Illusion Theater's new black box theater in south Minneapolis, Barb loses the use of the right half of her body. Carl, her husband, becomes her primary caregiver.

Using alternately tough and tender dialogue plus interior monologues from Barb, the show dives into their shared and divergent frustrations as they navigate the health care system and adapt to new life rhythms.

Don't be put off by the clunky title. "Barb and Carl" is a must-see that stands out for three principal reasons.

First, the play treats its subject matter with understanding and respect. It fills the rupture that devastates Brown and his longtime dramaturge, Barbara Rose-Brown, with wrenching action. "Barb and Carl" begins after Barb has taken a catastrophic tumble and Carl, living the unstable life of a playwright, drops everything to tend to her.

Even though she loses function in her brain — including the irreverent language they shared working together for decades — the couple forge a system of communication by knowing what the other means even if the words and gestures say the opposite. Barb often says "no" while nodding yes or vice versa.

Second, it is staged without fuss or guile by Brown on a mostly bare stage against a projected backdrop of neurons. Performances by the acting trio of Kimberly Richardson, JoeNathan Thomas and Laura Esping are outstanding and delivered with affecting honesty.

Richardson uses a wheelchair, a quad cane, and her vulnerable body to show Barb's journey. She makes us feel Barb's grit and tenacity. There's never any suggestion that her Barb, whether struggling to vocalize like a baby bird that's fallen out of a nest or stuck on the floor, is to be pitied.

This Barb was fearless before the stroke and continues to demand that respect. Richardson earns it for her with a touching but uncompromising turn.

Thomas gives Carl his unsentimental yet caring due. Pre-stroke, the couple's joy centered on work and words. Now, Carl grapples with the loss of his primary audience and support as he becomes those things and more for her. The actor translates his character's confusion in intonation, gestures and silences. He expresses in the way he looks at Barb or how his hand gently falls on her face as he kneels by her wheelchair.

Esping's performance shows that her character, generically called Healthcare Worker, deserves a human name. She plays the role with aplomb.

Third, this tear-jerker stands out for its poignant poetry. In nine scenes that range from "Aphasia" to "Pain," from "I Don't Want to Live Anymore" to "The Sound of Music," Brown goes deep into the pangs of catastrophic loss, showing the couple's attempts to fight back in body and spirit.

There are lots of stories in the canon about impetuous romance — tales of love rising in fullness like the moon. The play looks at the later phases of affection, where one holds the other in an embrace that passes understanding as they face the great beyond.

"Barb and Carl' makes it clear that that fight against falling into the abyss belongs to all of us.

'A Play by Barb and Carl'
By: Written and directed by Carlyle Brown.
Where: Illusion Theater, Center for Performing Arts, 3754 Pleasant Av. S., Mpls.
When: 7:30 p.m. Thu.-Sat., 2 p.m. Sun. Ends April 30.
Tickets: Name-your-price starting at $5. 612-767-9256 or illusiontheater.org.