ion theatre happily has found a home. Executive artistic director Claudio Raygoza and producing artistic director Glenn Paris have remodeled and reconfigured the former Compass (and before that, 6th@Penn) Theatre into a more comfortable and versatile black box venue with much improved sightlines. Seats with armrests, from Ion’s old venue, are placed along the back and side, rather than just the back, and making the stage more of a thrust than a proscenium. This, of course, brings the actors closer to the audience.

Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue.

^{Courtesy photo}

That new intimacy helps in the productions ion has chosen for the new theater's debut, Elliot, a Soldier’s Fugue and Back of the Throat, presented in repertory and called An American Duet. Elliot, by Quiara Alegría Hudes, is a character study of three generations of combat veterans from a Puerto Rican family living first in the Bronx, then North Philadelphia. Grandpop fought in Korea, Pop in Vietnam and Elliott in Iraq. There's also Ginny, an Army nurse who cared for Pop when he was wounded, then became his wife and Elliot's mother.

The densely packed 75 minutes comprise episodic scenes, a form like a musical fugue encompassing a theme developed through repetition and counterpoint. Here the theme is how each of the men reacted to their wartime experiences, like their mixed feelings about their first killings. There’s little extraordinary about the family and the battle descriptions, but Hudes’ script, enhanced by fine performances and Sylvia Enrique’s smooth direction, memorably develops each character.

Grandpop (Goyo Flores) remembers how, even with frostbitten fingers, he played Bach on his flute for his buddies, when the military kept Puerto Ricans in separate units. Pop (John Padilla) recalls his anger when his best pals were killed, two days of a mission looking only for body parts, and how Ginny (Miriam White) comforted him with extra care and all-night pot smoking when he was hospitalized with a leg full of shrapnel. And Elliot (Stephen Lone) explores the widest spread of memories — how a slain Vietcong’s blood looked green through night goggles, his agony when his leg is ripped open and the hospital sponge baths when he couldn’t help getting an erection.

Lone and White stand out, largely because the script lets them display more emotions — like Elliot’s sadness when his mother touches his scarred leg and he laments “having hands you love touch your worst part.” Or Ginny, as a mother excitedly describing her garden (“when your son goes to war, you want to plant everything”) or as nurse looking devilish as she recalls her randy feelings toward her patients, particularly Pop.

The play would be helped with more scenes of interaction and fewer of narration, since the underlying question is: Will Elliot re-enlist for another Iraq tour? One of Hudes’ points is that Grandpop and Pop, like most veterans, don’t talk to Elliot about war’s bad experiences, but what does Ginny think? We don’t find out.

Shulamit Nelson, assisted by Mariana Leon, provided the mostly military costumes. Matt Scott’s set is basic, garden greenery along the side and boxes that serve for chairs or beds. Claudio Raygoza’s lighting design prominently features backlight and silhouetting.

Cast and credits