Neil LaBute's "Fat Pig' by Theatre Horizon

Neil LaBute's Fat Pig is a daring choice for any theater, and particularly a small suburban company. The stereotypical audiences there, supposedly, want lighter fare, an impression reinforced lately by Theatre Horizon's success with its holiday reviews and other musicals.

But Erin Reilly and Matthew Decker, artistic directors of the Norristown-based company, have experience with major downtown companies as well as wide-ranging tastes. Decker now is directing an impressive production of this startling play.

The title and the story are meant to shock, even to offend. That's LaBute's shtick for calling attention to society's prejudices and injustices, and to some extent his strategy has succeeded: Fat Pig won the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Play in 2005.

Big-boned vs. slender

The play's four characters are Helen, a heavy woman; Tom, a young professional man with whom audiences will bond, even when they see that he has more insecurities than we wish we had; Carter, a smart-aleck male co-worker who voices the nasty prejudices that polite people suppress; and Jeannie, an attractive young woman who is an obvious contrast with the heavy woman.

Tom meets Helen in a cafeteria and is attracted by her blunt acknowledgment that her appearance bothers most men. They start to date. When Carter makes obnoxious comments about fat pigs, Tom becomes defensive and tries to keep the extent of his relationship with Helen hidden. Jeannie provokes prejudice and jealousy.

Eventually Helen gives Tom an ultimatum: either accept all of her— including defending her to his friends— or end the relationship. It's best if you don't know the ending in advance.

Carter and Jeannie repel us with their callous convictions that people should "run with their own kind." They are difficult to watch but also difficult to turn away from.

An earlier version

In an earlier staging (four years ago, upstairs at the Walnut Street Theatre), I saw an alternate interaction among the characters: Carter was the evil protagonist, the instigator of trouble, while Jeannie was pretty much an onlooker. At Theatre Horizon, the Carter has a slightly more sympathetic side while the Jeannie causes more of the trouble. As portrayed by the slender Erin Mulgrew, she emerges as a cousin of the psychotic Glenn Close character in Fatal Attraction.

The differences between the two interpretations suggest the depth of this play. The fact that either interpretation works is fascinating.

Melissa Joy Hart is endearing as the "big-boned" Helen. Her vulnerability is touching, and her put-downs of prejudicial insults are funny. Ed Renninger is intentionally troubling as the well-meaning Tom. Paul Felder draws us in with his congenial take on Carter.