Bachelorette

Writer-director Leslye Headland's fast-paced dark comedy is the second part of her seven-play series — each segment dealing with one of the Seven Deadly Sins. The theme for this particular entry is "Gluttony," but judging from all the boozing, boinking and hate-filled malice on display, the topic could just as easily have been Lust, Wrath or Pride. On the night before her wedding, sweet but dim bride-to-be Becky (Stefanie Black) has the poor judgment to let Regan (Laila Ayad), her unaccountably embittered and jealous maid of honor, spend the night in the wedding suite, while she spends the night with her future hubby. Regan invites Becky's two former high school rivals to party hearty with her. Much champagne is guzzled, cocaine is snorted off coffee tables, the wedding dress is spitefully shredded, and men are picked up at random from a nearby bar. Along the way, the women learn some harsh truths about themselves and how they truly feel about each other. Headland's ear for taut, brittle dialogue makes for some cruel, but scathingly funny, exchanges — and the performances nicely balance the characters' personal weaknesses with unexpectedly sympathetic vulnerabilities. As the self-medicating, manipulative maid of honor, Ayad creates an antiheroine who's both hateful and oddly tragic. Black's doelike Becky is also unusually touching, as is Adam Shapiro, as one of the women's golden-hearted one-night stand. Fridays, Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m. Starts: Jan. 26. Continues through Feb. 24, 2008