Play asks the cutting questions

Andrew (Wade Bogert O’Brien, left) and Sarah (Hallie Seline) are expecting a child in The Cut.

THEATRE REVIEW THE CUT ● Winnipeg Jewish Theatre ● Berney Theatre, Rady JCC ● To Sunday ★★★ out of five

AN IKEA nursery awaiting its tenant is the first stage into which visitors are allowed entry in playwright Jordi Mand’s The Cut.

We see an antique rocker and unmarked boxes strewn about, with a table lamp — an unofficial Near East, eternal candle — sitting on the unblemished carpet in the centre of the room. Sarah (Hallie Seline) and Andrew (Wade Bogert O’Brien) have a lot to unpack as they settle into their new home: two shelves of biography waiting for a third.

The box of books from Sarah’s parents is opened early: ‘Something From Nothing.’ Goodnight Bubbala! Andrew laughs, turning the volumes over, counting the wall of his future son’s room. ‘What are they building? A Jewish bookshelf?’

What did he just say about Something From Nothing? Phoebe Gilman’s beloved children’s folk tale about Joseph’s blanket, a grandfather, a needle and a thread?

Andrew (played with new-father frenzy by Bogert-O’Brien) and Sarah (Seline, whose character is attached to anxiety and a window of blue-sky hope) have been together for over a decade: he knows she’s Jewish, while her parents have reminded her over and again that he’s not.