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Theater

Dodging death

Rogers manages a historically and politically informative drama that augments its condemnation of American apathy and self-interest with some credible cloak-and-dagger and a regular polyglot of international cynicism. If the play lacks the imaginative heart of, say, Tony Kushner's Homebody/Kabul, it supplies human heart via the well-meaning Americans abroad whose already fragile ties are tested by unfamiliar strains and Kafka-esque circumstance. And the teen's blundering, if not that of his insufficiently cautious elders, is at least credible.

Moreover, Shawn LaCount's production, cast almost entirely with non-Equity actors, is buyable, from accents to emotions. Among the effective players are John Adekoje as a voluble Rwandan minister who keeps his menace under his caftan and Peter Brown as a jaded career diplomat who hasn't bothered with the host language beyond the word for "beer."