STAGE REVIEW : ‘Gift From Heaven’ Hewn From the Earth

The opening moments are darkness and music. As the last note fades, copper sunlight begins to steal through the splintered boards of a North Carolina cabin. A dirt-stained, young rag of a woman greets the morning with a snarl. From under the kitchen table a man’s leg is oddly visible. It belongs to the young woman’s brother, who is in customary hiding from a family curse that seems part William Faulkner, part Sam Shepard.

“A Gift From Heaven” at the Chamber Theatre is a remarkable playwrighting debut by actor David Steen (who plays the aforementioned brother). This four-character drama of incest leading to tragedy is rich with regional grit and poetry--including humor that rises from the fabric of the earth-hewn material.

The acting is acutely tuned, with power to leave you breathless. The plot unfolds inexorably, nevertheless catching you by surprise. And the production, directed by Jim Holmes, is flawlessly crafted. A gift from heaven, indeed.

The characters are a crazed mother (Sarah Hunley), her wild, unloved mountain girl of a daughter with the face and demeanor of a hatchet (Banks Harper), a brooding, festering son (Steen), and a tentative, shy, disarming cousin (Leanne Griffin), whose visit to the family hovel spills both blood and the hint of life reborn (at least for two of the characters--this is not a plot to give away). Harper’s performance as the fierce daughter named Messy is unforgettable, strands of her hair aswirl, her skin splotched with muck, her clothes barely hanging on her spidery figure. Hunley’s backwoods terror of a mother at one point horrifically breaks into biblical tongues.

As her son, Steen delivers a haunted portrayal as the entitled “gift” from the family’s dark past. Griffin’s blonde, diaphanous cousin glows. The ensemble works like a chamber quartet.

The players’ accents are cut from Appalachia. Their soiled, hand-me-down dresses and overalls (designed by Kathy Kish) droop on them in silly, melancholy shapes. The cabin interior (set design by Scot Wood) suggests an encampment with raggedy sheets for partitions and burlap for windows.

The lighting design (by Chris Roberts) moves through the textured measures of a full day, and musical motifs (by Charles Neuschwanger) create moody interludes. (Four of the off-stage creators, including director Holmes, are theater graduates of CalArts.)

This show is a tornado far off in the distance. And then comes the battering, the pain and the quiet. The curtain call eschews smiling faces and bows for variations of freeze frames. It seems the only possible fade-out.

Performances are at 3759 Cahuenga Blvd. West, Friday through Sunday, 8 p.m., running indefinitely. Tickets: $10. (213) 466-1767.