←Recommendations of Impossible Theories Of Us

A thoughtful and imaginative two-hander, Impossible Theories of Us explores love, identity, and memory with intelligence and emotional depth. John Mabey blends science and humanity through sharp, engaging dialogue and a compelling central relationship. The play’s speculative elements feel grounded in real emotion, creating a moving and thought-provoking theatrical experience that lingers.

What a beautiful poem of a play! The dialogue is a playful, tender dance that glides up on the sand, washes back into the ocean, and then returns again later. Mabey parcels out exposition so lightly that I felt as if I were eavesdropping. The reader receives just enough information to build a complete history of Gina and Keith’s marriage. We are also allowed to grapple with a technology that likely already exists. Haunting and heartfelt.

I was fortunate enough to see a staged reading of "Impossible Theories of Us" at Playhouse on Park in West Hartford. I was captivated from the first line of dialogue. John Mabey's witty dialogue drew me in quickly, as did the gentleness and complexity of the questions being explored. I was thoroughly engaged and left the reading craving to see a full production.

Amazing to find so much humanity in a play with A.I. ostensibly at its core. The ongoing conversation between Gina and Keith in their multiple forms (another theme of the play that is so well explored) is exciting, touching, engrossing - sometimes all at once. There are times where a brief statement made by one or the other was enough to pause my breath. This play raises so many questions in you, and it's just delightful to abide in its exploration. I can't wait to see this staged!

In Impossible Theories of Us, the way that love and connection are able to transfer through technology, through death, and through transition in the play is such a powerful depiction of the human experience. And while Mabey's use of imagery provides a lot of opportunity for very cool technical elements, the tenderness of the piece is what makes it so striking. This is an excellent option for theatres looking to produce a two person play with minimal set that packs a real punch!

This is a fabulously complex meditation on mortality and connection, full of wonderful language and thought-provoking ideas. Got a chance to see it at Seattle Public Theater's Distillery New Works Festival, and the audience was absolutely captivated. Highly recommend for theatres looking for a dynamic, low-resource two-hander to fill out their season.

The moral questions raised in this play are really important, and the play itself is filled with moments of tenderness, love and hope. I am moved by the relationship at its center and enjoy how Mabey keeps us guessing as to where the play might take us, how love and loss play out over time, and how humanity might be able to learn from technology as we respond to and learn from what it could offer. Such an imaginative piece! A beautiful play.

Because the mind cannot truly comprehend the idea of its own mortality, we create images, ideas, realms, worlds -- or afterworlds -- of what happens when one life ends. Does another begin? Can it be captured some way? And what happens to those we love and leave behind... do they still stay with us and us with them? John Mabey's play doesn't answer these profound questions, but the possibilities... oh, so many. The journeys of Gina and Keith are told in simple conversations that are deeply affecting and binding, and we become closer to the impossible theories and each other.

Oh my gosh, this beautiful play! It's about love and loss and change and denial and acceptance and so much more, and it feels like poetry. I love the layers to the dialogue and how the play is simultaneously a small play about one singular relationship, and also a giant play about enormous topics like ethics in science, grief, and faith. Impossible Theories of Us deserves all the praise it has already gotten and more!

Magic. A tiny miracle that grows and grows. That is the relationship we are allowed to bear witness to between Gina and Keith. This is a gift. Humans cling so hard to memory and each other, sometimes holding too tightly is how we lose what we had. But Gina clinging to Keith, both real and hologram, is actually evidence that they will always find each other again. Like energy seeking like energy. This is the most human science fiction you may ever experience.