You & Me is an ambitious, highly stylized new drama written and directed by Anthony M. Laura.  The play takes place in Kensington, a presumably made-up small town in upstate New York.  It’s the kind of town that’s so often utilized in works of fiction, both realistically and not-so-realistically: a community where everyone seemingly knows everyone else (and knows everyone else’s business too…), news travels very fast via word of mouth, and people often dream about leaving– but just as often, don’t ever realize that dream.  The audience of You & Me learns that a year ago, Kensington unwittingly became both famous and infamous because there was a mass shooting/suicide committed by a college student named Delilah Prescott.  The body count was 12.  When the play opens, it’s clear that the residents of Kensington are still dealing with a form of, in lay terms, “mass PTSD”. 

You & Me opens on the day of a planned memorial for the shooting victims, to be held at the neighborhood diner.  Immediately, the audience gets to eavesdrop on the interactions between some of the young female residents of the town: Chloe Prescott (Brianne Buishas) is Delilah’s emotionally wounded twin sister, who was initially falsely identified as the shooter.  Chloe is still trying, with all her strength, to find any remaining piece of information about WHY her sister did what she did.  Paris (Sydney Law), an aspiring dancer, is the reluctant heir to the diner.  Ellie (Alexandra Rooney), an aspiring actress, is also there for… shall we say, spiritual support. The conversation between these three young women starts out slow, polite, and cautious.  But the audience soon realizes that there are a LOT of emotions simmering underneath the surface.  Any expectation of manners or dainty behavior are busted with the blunt-talking Leighton (Ellivia Gold), who’s just full of salt and vinegar.  Leighton meets her match, however, with Mackenzie, AKA “Mac” (Courtnie Keaton), who can more than hold her own against Leighton and the rest of the town with her “don’t give-an-eff” attitude.  It becomes clear that the young residents of this town are still in the healing process… and that, as we learn later on, some of the emotional wounds have been more serious than others.  Aurora (played wonderfully by Isa Mellody), a former resident of Kensington who comes to visit with her fiancé Brandon (Delano Allen), has her own way of “coping” with her own trauma.  It’s disquieting for the audience to watch. With Mackenzie, it’s even more personal: She and Delilah had been in a romantic relationship– and Mackenzie was not only emotionally but also physically injured by the shooting.  Rounding out the residents of Kensington is  Dr. Anne Eisenberg (Susan Neuffer), who was Delilah’s therapist just before the tragedy took place.

Chloe’s quest for the answers are complicated with the mysterious appearance of a handwritten journal, which may or may not have been written by Delilah. It’s also clear that Mackenzie may be transferring at least some of her love for the late Delilah onto Chloe– who, as the audience discovers, is not entirely resistant.  The playwright explores some genuinely delicate and complicated territory with this particular turn of events.   In a parallel plot, two other young women have arrived in Kensington.  Riley Gardner (Rheanna Salazar) is an actress whose visit to Kensington is ostensibly for shooting a horror movie, but who is actually motivated by her desire to play Chloe/Delilah in a very different movie based upon the town’s tragedy. She brings her scrappy kid sister Maude (Cordelia Cornell) with her.  In this day and age of exploiting real-life tragic moments in history by morphing them into slick, glossy entertainment, this subplot could not be more timely.  More about the cast later, but I’ll take this time to say that Salazar and  Cornell work very well together as sisters: Maude is the clearly the id to Riley’s ego. She even gets her own romance in the form of a shy local boy named Julian (Cole Bellorgey), which allows the young lovers to add some levity to the play’s serious themes, and also to indulge in some gratuitously cute musical numbers and jokes.  In fact, despite the serious subject matter of the play, You & Me does have many moments of humor, mostly in the dialogue given to the younger cast members. (As Martha, Scarlett Gleason— presumably the youngest cast member– is a rising revelation.) 

The second act of many plays is usually the time for revelations, and You & Me is no exception: When the planned memorial finally happens, there is no shortage of exposed secrets from almost all of the characters: Kensington, it seems, turns out to be a modern-day Peyton Place with its affinity for gossip, hearsay, rumors, mys-tery characters, and mis-communications.  The climax of the play comes when all these revelations prove to be too much for Chloe, who goes face-to-face with her own trauma.  The result is challenging for the audience to watch.  Had You & Me ended at this moment, it could have more than assuredly made its point.  But to his credit, Mr. Laura is committed to tying up (almost) all of the loose ends.  The playwright is also equally committed to giving all of his cast their own moments to show their talents.  As you may have figured by now, You & Me has a lot of characters to fit into its running time– and some critics may even argue that the playwright/director has written too many people into his piece.  True, because each of those characters has their own unique story to tell, You & Me could have easily been expanded into two separate productions.  Although having too many characters and/or plotlines in one piece can indeed sometimes have a negative effect on a production, Laura thankfully manages to do it well.  

As the two main characters, Brianne Buishas and Courtnie Keaton succeed both separately and together as Chloe and Mackenzie respectively.  Via flashback scenes, Buishas and Keaton also get to play double roles of sorts: We get to briefly meet both Delilah and Mac before she was scarred both emotionally and physically by the shooting.  It’s almost like watching a different actress in the role.  Susan Neuffer is also wonderful in the role of Ann Eisenberg, especially in Act 2 where she gets a meatier presence.  As Leighton, Ellevia Gold is very good in a smaller but pivotal role. The 12 actors in the cast clearly have a wide range of experience, and while they all work hard, some of them are still a bit “green”– although endearingly so.  

Anthony M. Laura has a background in filmmaking, and that is quite obvious with his direction in You & Me.  Things move around V-E-R-Y quickly in this piece, which may take a while for some audience members to get used to.  As a reviewer, I find it a refreshing change from the more static or “stagey” style that so many pieces of theater choose to take, mostly for the sake of tradition.

You & Me is more important than ever as we enter the second half of 2026.  As difficult as it is to admit, mass shootings seem to have become a regular occurrence in the United States.  This provocative show is a reminder that even though we may be slowly losing our shockability, it’s thankfully much harder to lose our humanity.  The show is also a reminder that faith is a renewable resource.

Face to Face Films presents the World Premiere of You & Me, written and directed by Anthony M. Laura, at A.R.T./New York’s Jeffrey and Paula Gural Theatre, 502 West 53rd Street, NYC. Performances continue through May 9th.  For tickets and more information, visit https://www.youandmetheplay.com/