Puppeteer Justin Viz with Jeenu and Daniel Cuff as Ryan in “Wolf Play.” Photo by French’s Fotos

The final production of the 2024 Portland Theater Festival was marked by resonant howling on opening night, some in celebration and some in sadness.

The compelling spirit of a wolf takes a prominent role in Hansol Jung’s highly imaginative, wild, crazy and ultimately very touching 2022 “Wolf Play.” It’s a family tragicomedy where audience laughter and tears are never very far apart.

The play concerns a lesbian/non-binary couple, Robin and Ash, who have adopted a 6-year-old Korean child from a previous adoptive couple through a rather sketchy internet process (the legalities become important later).

The new parents immediately start arguing about whether it was a good idea to adopt when one of them is consumed with ambition to become a professional boxer. Meanwhile the original adoptive father, Peter, begins to have second thoughts after learning the child will go to a home where he will have “no father.”

Robin’s brother Ryan, who manages Ash, also has his own strong opinions.
At the center of the fray is Jeenu, the child who is physically embodied in the play by an uncannily believable puppet manipulated by an actor who voices both the boy’s dialogue and his lone wolf spirit. Scenes of intimate bonding with Jeenu’s new parents contrast with harrowing moments of violence to create a sense of anxiety about how things will shake out in the end.

Questions concerning social attitudes toward same-sex parenting weigh heavily amid lighter moments when the characters’ lives become more about joy than struggle. Overlapping scenes sometimes mix comedy with confrontation.

Justin Viz plays the puppeteer who offers some philosophical overview, as well as tidbits of wolf lore, while bringing the “boy” to life. His work with the puppet (designed by Libby Marcus) gives heart to the show in unexpected ways.

Imani Pearl Williams as Ash and Marie Stewart Harmon as Robin in “Wolf Play.” Photo by French’s Fotos

Local favorite Marie Stewart Harmon gives her Robin both warmth and tenacity as she deals with the normal difficulties of having a first child and the pressures placed on her about her life choices.

Imani Pearl Williams fills the role of boxer Ash with a physicality that only partially masks a growing attachment to Jeenu. Jared Mongeau is the manic Peter, comical but ultimately a threat to the boy’s security. Likewise, Daniel Cuff’s Ryan is a well-meaning but insensitive hardhead who thinks he knows what’s best for all concerned.

Kelly O’Donnell directed the 100-minute show, with no intermission, in an intimately arranged industrial space provided by the Portland design and building firm Kendrick & Bloom. It’s one of the “non-traditional theater spaces” found for this season by Portland Theater Festival Executive and Artistic Director Dave Register. In it, O’Donnell and a talented technical staff have inventively put together a minimally appointed but thoroughly engaging production that theatrically highlights some of the challenges new families face today.

Steve Feeney is a freelance writer who lives in Portland.