Five women in their forties to seventies and one man in his forties gather at a clinic two hours north of San Francisco to continue to deal with their pain. The regimen includes fasting and drinking a variety of beverages. Eileen (Marylouise Burke) is hungry and tired. Elaine (Brenda Pressley) has osteoporosis. Ginnie (Kristine Nielsen) has “auto-immune thyroid stuff but mostly she’s here for her vertigo.” Yvette (Mia Katigbak) “narrates pornography for blind people” and suffers from a long list of ailments and conditions including a recurrence of cancer. Sofi (Christina Kirk) suffers from urinary-genital afflictions coupled, unfortunately, with an active sexual fantasy life. Nelson (Pete Simpson) has severe gastrointestinal issues who seems to enjoy scatological-sexual repartee with Sofi and sharing images of his colonoscopies.

These six clients share common space in Annie Baker’s intelligent and challenging “Infinite Life” currently running at Atlantic Theater Company’s Linda Gross Theater. This space is physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual. Although they arrive in pain and depart in pain, their time together is transformational and cathartic. There is incremental healing among the six as they share stories about their lives and their pain, as they read, and color, and sip. But the most dynamic healing – and the trope for healing in Baker’s play – occurs in the relationship between Sofi and Eileen. Their journey toward wellness – if not a pain-free boon – begins at the beginning of the play and serves as the play’s unexpected but engaging denouement.

With her usual talent in digging deep into the characters she portrays, Marylouise Burke successfully explores her character Eileen’s surface and rich depth from the first scene where she meets Sofi, throughout the remaining scenes, and especially in the play’s conclusion. Their “bookend” scenes anchor all that comes in between.

Perhaps there is no solution to human pain and suffering.  Indeed, that pain may be as infinite as life itself. Annie Baker suggests one possibility that depends on the infinite power of human relationships