THE STORY: The setting is the present-day Hamptons, that sun drenched stretch of expensive ocean frontage where the rich and privileged while away their summers. Two attractive college girls, Amy-Joy and Amy-Beth, are looking for a good time, and think they have found it in the person of Kip, a handsome preppie who is in flight from the lavish home he shares with his divorced, domineering and bitingly sophisticated mother and her narcissistic married lover. And romance does develop, if not quite in the manner anticipated, as the triangular affair of the young people is deftly counterpointed against the vapid relationship of the older couple. But while high comedy and sharp observation prevail, the play yields a lacerating portrait of a contemporary upper-middle-class that is, sadly and humorously, bored, self-indulgent and emotionally reckless.
A piercingly funny and perceptive short play which, in its production by New York’s Ensemble Studio Theatre, as part of their One-Act Play Marathon, brought immediate popular and critical acclaim to its author.
“LIFE UNDER WATER is no mere gem. It is a full-bodied 45-minute work that marks the arrival of a young playwright with a big future.” —The New York Times.
“…a fully realized piece of high comedy, sharply observed and rich in feeling.” —Village Voice.
“Greenberg, like a champion fencer, hits with the fewest, fastest, most economical strokes right to the heart. And with what witty disenchantment, what heartbreaking humor!” —New York Magazine.
