Abby Rosebrock’s “Lowcountry” at the Atlantic Theater Company follows two TikTok-matched strangers on their first date in David’s studio apartment in Moncks Corner, South Carolina. David (Babak Tafti) is a registered sex offender attending Sexaholics Anonymous, trying to regain custody of his son. Tally (Jodi Balfour) arrives early as he prepares dinner. Their casual conversation tailspins into unexpected tragedy.

Both are marginalized. David is Brown and poor; his mentor Paul (Keith Kupferer) is white and affluent. Tally carries family trauma. Both lack agency, haunted by pasts they can’t escape. Rosebrock uses their status to interrogate systems that fail to address poverty or provide genuine restoration for those suffering from addiction.

Under Jo Bonney’s direction, Tafti and Balfour deliver authentic performances, carefully disclosing secrets as their cat-and-mouse encounter heightens in sexual energy. David wants to avoid sex; Tally needs to seduce him into vulnerability—a vehicle for revealing a past they share that David has forgotten. When they swiped right on Tinder, both assumed they wanted the same thing. They don’t.

This mental, physical, and spiritual seduction plays out on Arnulfo Maldonado’s sparse set, with enough clues to David’s trauma to make the design succeed. The makeshift curtain separating David’s bed from the rest of the apartment falls repeatedly during conversation. His failed attempts to refasten it and Tally’s successful ones serve as metaphor for libidinous desire and desperate need to connect.

That connection becomes eerily stronger when Paul arrives to confront David about lying regarding his sexual “sobriety.” What follows is unexpected and related to Tally’s nihilistic worldview. The play raises enduring questions about right and wrong, challenging comfortable assumptions about moral ambiguity and situational ethics.