SOBER TRUTHS AND SLIPPERY MEMORIES
IN A COMIC, CHAOTIC QUEST FOR CLARITY
Alcoholism and Alzheimer’s. What a combo. Sounds serious, right? They both are, of course. But in the hands of playwright Jake Brasch, The Reservoir at Geffen Playhouse pulls off a theatrical magic trick: a powerfully moving and poignantly funny play, melding millennial angst with elder wisdom and folly in a heart-warming and heartbreaking semi-autobiographical tale of recovery and tough love. It’s a two-act memory play with bite.
Lee Wilkof, Carolyn Mignini, Jake Horowitz, Geoffrey Wade and Liz Larsen
Josh (Jake Horowitz) is coming off a bender. He’s a gay, Jewish, NYU student on medical leave for excessive drinking. He’s been booted from his sober living house, and wakes up alongside the Cherry Creek Reservoir in Colorado, near where his mother and both sets of grandparents live. There’s a deep cut on his arm. And he doesn’t remember how that happened or how he got here.
Lee Wilkof and Jake Horowitz
Loss of memory links his alcoholism with the dementia experienced by his grandparents. After sneaking in through the doggy door and sleeping on her couch, Josh begs his mother (Marin Hinkle, playing multiple roles) to let him stay with her, promising one more time to get sober. He gets a job in a bookstore, and discovers a book espousing “cognitive reserve,” the theory that certain activities can help protect against the onset of dementia or other brain damage.
Adrián González and Jake Horowitz
“If you have high cognitive reserve,” says the book’s author Yaakov Stern (one of several roles played by Adrián González) “you can use other pathways once disease forms.” Which inspires Josh to say, “So all we have to do is to find new ways… to reach our reserves. Our reservoirs!” Latching onto the idea, he makes it his mission to help his grandparents strengthen their minds while attempting to repair his own.
Carolyn Mignini, Jake Horowitz
And then there’s the spinach: “Drinking causes a thiamine deficiency,” says the outsized and outlandish self-help guru, Jeanette McFolly (also Hinkle). She got sober without the 12 Steps by eating one pound of organic spinach every day and soaking her fingers in cider vinegar for an hour a day.
Liz Larsen, Lee Wilkof, Carolyn Mignini, Geoffrey Wade and Jake Horowitz
Conservative grandparents Nana Irene (Carolyn Mignini) and Grandpa Hank (Geoffrey Wade) have moved into assisted living, while snarky and sassy grandmother Beverly (Liz Larsen) invites Josh to Jazzercise, where Josh begins testing everyone’s memories by making them recite the names of US Vice Presidents backwards. Grandpa Shrimpy (Lee Wilkof) asks for help with his second Bar Mitzvah because he’s 83 years old. “They expect you to be dead by age 70. So if you live another 13 years, it’s like you’re 13 once more. Do you think I’ll go through puberty again? It was hell the first time.”
Geoffrey Wade, Adrián Gonzalez, Jake Horowitz, Carolyn Mignini,
Marin Hinkle, Lee Wilkof, production assistant Lisa Toudic and Liz Larsen
Dialogue moves at a rapid back-and-forth pace, matched by Shelley Butler‘s assured direction, which moves quickly but thoroughly through the ups and downs, blending just the right degree of reality, fantasy and comedy with her believable shape-shifting ensemble. When Josh’s overactive mind wanders, it’s mimed by the grandparents. Describing his “train” of thought, they line up like rail cars and rotate their shoulders like the wheels of a locomotive. When he shifts the metaphor to a “river of thought” they undulate in waves across the stage, even as he fears the river will end in a sea full of irresistible Wild Turkey.
Marin Hinkle, Lee Wilkof, Jake Horowitz, Geoffrey Wade and Liz Larsen
A co-production of Denver Center for the Performing Arts and Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre, this world premiere play’s simple but effective set by Takeshi Kata is lit by Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew to maximize the stage area, which has four rectangular shaped prosceniums with rounded and sloping edges that are lined with lights and stacked in diminishing size from front to back. The stage itself is almost bare except for four chairs on a pedestal at the rear, standing before a projection screen. Props and furniture are rolled out on stage as needed, from bookshelves, to a couch, to a dining table and recliner chair. One of the most dramatic scenes depicts the storm inside Josh’s brain as he struggles to say sober. Multi-colored lights on the prosceniums flash and strobe along with hallucinogenic projections on the back screen, all enhanced by Michael Costagliola’s impressive sound collage.
Geoffrey Wade (background), Jake Horowitz and Liz Larsen
With abundant sincerity, it’s the hilarity that makes the play soar. On the script’s title page, Brasch notes: “Play against the pain. In spite of everything, let this be a celebration of life.” That comes through in this buoyant and highly energetic play.
Lee Wilkof, Liz Larsen, Adrián González and Geoffrey Wade
In the end, The Reservoir is not just about sobriety or senility, but about memory itself—how we lose it, how we rebuild it, and how we use it to stay tethered to the people we love. With laughter as its lifeline and heart as its compass, Brasch’s moving debut reminds us that healing—whether from booze or broken synapses—is never linear. But with enough spinach, storytelling, and second chances, we just might find our way back to ourselves.
Jake Horowitz, Liz Larsen and Geoffrey Wade
photos by Jeff Lorch
poster photo by Justin Bettman
Jake Horowitz, Carolyn Mignini, Adrián González and Geoffrey Wade
The Reservoir
Geffen Playhouse, 10866 Le Conte Avenue in Westwood
2 hours and 15 minutes, including intermission
Wed-Fri at 8; Sat at 3 & 8; Sun at 2 & 7 (check for variances)
ends on July 20, 2025
for tickets, call 310.208.5454 or visit Geffen Playhouse
for more shows, visit Theatre in LA
Sarah A. Spitz is an award-winning public radio producer, retired from KCRW, where she also produced arts stories for NPR. She writes features and reviews for various print and online publications.
