Playwright: John Loos. At: Annoyance Theater, 851 W. Belmont Ave. Tickets: 773-697-9693; www.theannoyance.com; $20. Runs through: Jan. 22
Playwright John Loos was once a photographer for his school yearbook—duty endowing him with an insider's view of the "unchecked aggression, emotion, joy, loss and friendship" associated with women's collegiate basketball. His account of the fictional Tallahassee Lady Fireballs encompasses all of these themes, paying homage to the tropes of sweat-and-soap epics while still delivering plenty of Annoyance's trademark bawdiness.
The Fireballs have taken the state championship every year except 1998, the year of a stadium shooting. Their success is attributed to the coaching of Debra Champion, whose win-at-any-cost obsession stems from Electral conflicts with her abusive dad, uneasiness over her lingering attraction to rival coach Linda Silverslit and confusion over her own biological ambiguity. ( WNBA buffs looking for parallels to the career of the legendary Pat Summitt can stop here. ) Coach Deb's endocrine system, you see, produces an overabundance of testosterone, leading to the growth of embryonic testicles within her ovaries—hence "lady balls." Upon learning that these extraneous organs may someday migrate through her body like deadly blood clots, her priorities undergo a change toward more humanitarian goals.
Her young players are no less perplexed, facing such distractions as nightmare visions of opponents crippled by rage-fueled fouls and pregnancies incurred during post-game hot tub soaks ( off-duty jocks go to "gentlemen's clubs," but hoopster-girls shake out at spas ), not to mention a team medic who never saw a sports injury that couldn't cured by micro-massage in—um, just the right places. Even the villains are granted a kind of justification, as when Gwendolyn Brooke Shields, the New Age widow of the school's late athletic director, vows to avenge the destruction of her art center to make way for a new gymnasium.
Steering this scenario in the role of Coach Deb is Loos himself, his mesomorphic physique and stentorian baritone undiminished by wig, padding, scarlet high-heeled pumps and, at one point, merkin-embellished panty hose. Sayjal Joshi, Becca Levin and Julie Marchiano likewise create scene-stealing characters, and the entire ensemble is to be commended for keeping the scattershot mayhem firmly grounded in its premise. As in an actual match, there is almost too much action packed into the show's 90-minutes-plus-intermission running time to absorb in one sitting. ( Did I mention the individual flashbacks, the expository songs provided by stageside musicians, Deb's appearance on The View and a brief history of women athletes dating from antiquity? ) Just mind your own corner's play-in-progress and remember that, ultimately, it's the game that counts.
