Finding The Beauty In CAROLINE — Review

At the center of Caroline, Preston Max Allen’s tender new play at MCC, is, well, Caroline (River Lipe-Smith): the precocious nine-year-old of the struggling-but-making-it-work Maddie (Chloë Grace Moretz). Caroline is equal parts sweet and acerbic. She easily sees through the masks adults wear, as only a child who has been through much more than her peers can, like when she reports back to her mother after spending some time with the grandmother she has just met: “She was kind of, like, too nice. She seemed stressed about being nice.”

When we first meet Caroline, it’s clear her life hasn’t been easy: her arm is in a cast and she sits with her mom in a seedy diner surrounded by the sum total of everything they own—a few pieces of luggage and some backpacks. They’re on the run. Maddie talks to her daughter about the difficulties of finding them a place to stay, a school, healthcare. There’s talk of doctors and her inability to pay for them. This is no ordinary mother-daughter relationship.

Maddie is a recovering addict, cut off from her wealthy parents at fifteen, raising a trans daughter alone. Caroline is Maddie’s world. She does everything for her. When their situation in West Virginia becomes untenable, Maddie packs everything up and seeks refuge in the last place she wants to go back to: the home of her mother, Rhea (Amy Landecker).

With her perfectly coiffed hair and her almost–too-preppy-to-be-believable style (costumes by David Hyman), the audience anticipates Rhea’s reaction to the reappearance of her delinquent daughter and the granddaughter she didn’t know she had, but Allen is a smarter playwright than that and his deft hand is obvious throughout.

At every turn, Caroline (the play) resists the temptation to foray into the lurid public discourse surrounding trans children. This isn’t a play about debates. None of Allen’s characters parrot hateful rhetoric or display phobic behavior of any kind. With that out of the way, I could breathe easier.

Rhea is more than ready to accept her trans granddaughter. (“We’re not Republicans!” she quips.) What she isn’t ready to do is trust her daughter again. Old wounds are slow to heal and though progress is made, there’s a fundamental distrust that exists at the center of their relationship. And yet, when Rhea makes a tantalizing, though heartbreaking, offer to take care of Caroline, Maddie still considers it even though it’s not the future she envisioned because it would be best for her daughter.

All three actors have fantastic chemistry, especially Moretz and Lipe-Smith, whose intimate bond lights up the piece. It’s been years since Moretz has been onstage but she delivers a devastating and heartfelt performance. I hope she continues to pursue opportunities in theatre. In their off-Broadway debut, Lipe-Smith embodies the title role with an emotional depth beyond their years.  

If Landecker doesn’t leave as much of an impact as her co-stars, it’s not her fault. We see her identify another chance at motherhood in being a part of Caroline’s life, perhaps even a chance to make up for past mistakes, but she’s still unable to move forward with her own daughter. There’s a thinness to Allen’s plot that doesn’t give Rhea many places to go, emotionally and physically. David Cromer is an excellent director, and his skills are on full display here, yet it often appeared as if the three actors were lost roving around Lee Jellinek’s confusing set. 

The complex, emotional relationships at play keep Caroline afloat: the love and openness between Maddie and Caroline, Maddie’s determination to be the mother she needed as a child, Caroline’s disarming honesty with her new grandma. Caroline’s final lines are an emotional gut-punch and a reminder of the beauty that can spring from the worst circumstances. 

‍Caroline runs through November 2 at the Susan & Ronald Frankel Theater at MCC. Tickets information can be found here.