When Pierre Corneille wrote “L’illusion Comique” in 1636, the inspiration for Tony Kushner’s (“Angels in America”) adaptation, his concept of a play-within-a-play was ahead of its time. No longer a new innovation, Kushner manages to condense and contemporize Corneille’s time-traveling fable while retaining his Baroque conceit that life is a stage. Despite Kushner's lighter tone, the play is still full of disguises and changing identities, maintaining the game of illusions that mix realism with the theatrical.

The story follows a seventeenth-century lawyer named Pridamant who seeks a reclusive magician’s help in finding the son he once banished. Deep within his watery grotto, the sorcerer magically conjures up three diverse episodes from the young man’s life. Within each scene the prodigal son’s name changes as do his allegiances, the locale and the time period. It isn’t until the final moments that Pridamant and the audience finally understand the reason behind these mysterious changes.

The Promethean Theatre Ensemble members all make a very good showing, but they often surpass the material. Despite Kushner’s track record as a Tony and Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, and the play’s many humorous moments, it just never really grabs you. This is partly because it can’t decide whether it wants to be a comedy or a drama, and the story’s linear plot is too often broken up and interlaced with other subplots. To their credit, the actors deliver Kushner’s poetic dialogue with crisp clear diction. Their ability to handle the play’s theatricality are definite pluses, and Jeanne Jones’ wildly inventive costumes and Roger Wykes’ simple, stylized, multi-locale set also contribute much to this production. They just can’t make up for a story that confuses far more than it clarifies.