For six scenes, “Becky Shaw” unfolds in shadows – David Zinn’s dark grays, Stacey Derosier’s moody shafts of light illuminating secrets and lies. Then, in scene seven, everything floods with brightness: whites, creams, merciless clarity. It’s a design choice that mirrors Gina Gionfriddo’s thematic strategy – dragging uncomfortable truths into the light. “Unless you’re Gandhi or Jesus, you have a limited sphere of responsibility,” declares Max, the play’s pragmatic realist. “You have a plot of land.” But what if someone drowning grabs hold of your plot? In Trip Cullman’s pitch-perfect production, that question stays uncomfortable from first scene to final blackout.

Gionfriddo’s dark comedy interrogates obligation, damage, and who we owe. When well-meaning newlyweds Suzanna and Andrew set up a blind date between her pseudo-brother Max and his fragile coworker Becky Shaw, an armed robbery interrupts the evening. What follows is a vicious comedy of manners about whether damaged people can love, whether they should hide their damage, and whether good intentions matter when they enable manipulation. The tone is spot-on tragic comedy – the production earns both adjectives, often in the same breath.

If there’s a standout in this uniformly excellent ensemble, it’s Alden Ehrenreich’s Max. His performance is perfection. Ehrenreich refuses to play Max as simply an asshole – he’s a pragmatist and a realist who survived a broken childhood and, unbeknownst to him, was “bought” by Suzanna’s now-deceased father to prevent being sent away after his mother’s death. Ehrenreich makes you understand why Suzanna can’t quit him, why his ruthless competence feels like love to people who’ve never known stability. It’s a masterclass in making the unsympathetic devastatingly human.

Madeline Brewer’s Becky successfully earns the victim-to-manipulative-predator transition, and she does it subtly from the play’s beginning. Gionfriddo’s foreshadowing is well-crafted, and Brewer handles it with surgical precision. While Becky’s post-robbery trauma is believable, it’s already clear she’s a manipulator who easily seduces Andrew (an easily swayed and earnest Patrick Ball). Brewer never telegraphs the shift – she reveals what was there all along.

Lauren Patten’s Suzanna and Linda Edmond’s Susan complete the ensemble with equal authenticity. These are actors who have achieved excellence in their craft on screen and on stage, and they prove in “Becky Shaw” that they’re comfortable in both media. The honesty and believability they bring to these damaged, damaging people is what makes the play work. When Andrew tells Suzanna, “Our problem is not Becky,” the line lands with devastating force because we’ve watched the deep family and relationship dysfunction that preceded it.

The play handles race with unflinching clarity. Becky’s confession about “terrible racist feelings” after the holdup reveals itself as manipulation – it has nothing to do with her trauma and everything to do with weaponizing vulnerability. Susan’s racism, by contrast, is authentic and unforgivable, and Suzanna calls her on it in scene seven. The play doesn’t resolve these tensions; it simply illuminates them.

Trip Cullman’s direction is deft and graceful, moving the action forward with proper momentum. In an inspired choice, he allows the cast to assist with scene changes, scurrying around to avoid contact with moving set elements – this is particularly evident between the last two scenes. The action shifts quickly between comedy and tragedy, and Cullman and his cast handle both moods with perfect timing.

Zinn’s scenic design and Derosier’s lighting work in concert to chart the play’s movement from concealment to revelation. The first six scenes unfold in shades of dark gray, with drop-down black screens dividing the stage and shafts of light highlighting action and actors – illuminating the secrets and lies, especially Becky’s. The final scene in Susan’s Richmond home is bathed in bright light, the set rendered in whites and cream colors. Here in scene seven, everything “comes out” and truth is revealed. Kaye Voyce’s costumes and M.L. Dogg’s sound design contribute equally to the production’s sustained mood – every element calibrated to keep the audience off-balance.

The production remains uncomfortable throughout, maintaining Gionfriddo’s refusal to tell you who’s right or who to root for. Even in the final moments, when Becky takes slow steps toward Max just before the blackout, the production offers no comfort, no resolution – only the chilling recognition that damaged people find each other, and we can’t look away.

“Becky Shaw” is a must-see, a standout Broadway play in this current season. The 2008 setting doesn’t diminish the narrative’s total relevance – if anything, the questions about obligation and empathy feel more urgent now. This is a knife fight disguised as a dinner party, and Cullman’s production understands the assignment.