Given that Gordon McIntyre’s Scottish indie band Ballboy is known for songs such as “I Wonder If You’re Drunk Enough to Sleep With Me Tonight” and “Let’s Fall in Love and Run Away From Here,” playwright David Greig didn’t need to go far for inspiration when scripting “Midsummer (A Play With Songs).”
Greig is the prolific and eclectic Scottish writer whose barroom folklore odyssey “The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart” and grief-stricken choral opus “The Events” had their U.S. premieres at New Haven’s International Festival of Arts & Ideas. Combining Greig and McIntyre’s helpless-yet-hopeful worldview makes for a sublimely snarky modern love story.
“Midsummer,” on a drunken romantic rampage at TheaterWorks through Aug. 21, alternates full-bodied theatrics and acoustic song duets in a manner that is both fluid and frantic. It’s a carefully constructed tale of debauchery and escape, filled with coincidences and contrivances. But it also has a wondrous ability to step outside of itself and ruminate on the concepts of free will and true love. Likewise, the songs can seem repetitive at times, but they are launching pads for sparkling expressions of beauty, harmony and freedom.
“Midsummer” has had numerous American productions since it was first performed in Edinburgh in 2009. This one’s directed by Tracy Brigden, who was the associate artistic director at Hartford Stage in the late 1990s and has been the artistic director of the City Theatre Company in Pittsburgh for the past 15 years. Brigden directed “Midsummer” at City Theatre, with a different cast but the same design team, in 2015.
The fresh-faced Rebecca Hart — in a fetching blue sundress, brown vinyl jacket and burgundy tights — plays Helena, a lawyer with a drinking problem who has become a disappointment to her family and has given up on finding a meaningful relationship. M. Scott McLean — with a Teddy Boy haircut and rakish grin — is Bob, who gets by running small jobs for local crime bosses. Both are in their mid-30s, which is modern theater shorthand for washed-up and directionless. When they meet, their destinies collide — and combust.
Bob and Helena narrate their own wild adventures and play all the minor characters along the way. When not simulating sex or toting a bag of stolen money around the stage, they’re wielding virtually identical Taylor guitars and crooning about heartbreak, oblivion and Japanese rope bondage. For one of the lighter tunes, they brandish a Luna-brand ukulele.
Many of the “Midsummer” bits work as solid stand-alone routines, like the dialogue between Bob and his penis, or “The Hangover Song,” which begins “If my hangover was a country it would be Belgium.”
Personally, I wish this were a punkier presentation, more in line with the Jesus and Mary Chain song references that pepper Bob’s fantasies, and more like Ballboy’s noisily trenchant first album “A Guide for the Daylight Hours.” But Brigden and her cast clearly want to emulate the Irish pub sounds of the hit acoustic musical “Once” and not the scrappy Scottish alt-pop of The Pastels, The Jasmine Minks, Arab Strap or early Belle and Sebastian. As I looked around me at all the elderly faces at the Sunday matinee, I supposed TheaterWorks made the right choice for its subscriber base — blow their minds but leave their eardrums alone. But louder, more aggressive playing would be a better match for the vulgar language, obnoxious behavior and manic energy that fuels the talky parts of “Midsummer.”
I can quibble about decibels, but “Midsummer” is a dream of a show for TheaterWorks. It’s something you could happily see several times, the way you’d check in on a favorite local band in a bar. I hope it gets the young, club-hopping audience it deserves. “Midsummer” is mad fun.
“MIDSUMMER (A PLAY WITH SONGS)” strums, swears and cuddles through Aug. 21 at TheaterWorks, 233 Pearl St., Hartford. Performances are Tuesday through Thursday at 7:30 p.m., Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2:30 and 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2:30 p.m. Tickets are $40 to $65, $15 for student rush. 860-527-7838, theaterworkshartford.com
