A House Divided has as its theme “can’t we all just get along?”.  That, of course, is why the play never sells itself to the audience.  When the “divisions” involve hatred because of race, gender identity, or general civil rights, we cannot afford the tolerance that Crone argues would be a good thing.   A House Divided is not nearly as repulsive as A Beautiful Future which argued that Nazis and French Collaborators deserve love too, but there is no way that these characters “love” each other.  Anything beyond reluctant tolerance because most of them are family is a significant stretch.

Even the set needs to be questioned.  Why would you set a family Thanksgiving play in the living room?  It requires a setting in a dining room, either real or improvised.  Sitting around the table would make the tension far more palpable.  We need to see anger rise and fall over “Alice’s” “charred” turkey. Whether this was a director’s or author’s choice is unknown, but it is a major error.

Alyssa Simon as Rosalie is the best of the actors, but none of them really has much to work with. 

None of the characters has significant redeeming values.  “Jim” is a racist, anti-vaxxer convinced that life is a zero-sum game where, when anyone else wins, he loses.  “Rosalie” tries too hard to do the “right thing” but lacks the education to understand and overcome the prejudices she grew up with.  “Alice”, as the grandmother, embodies deeply engrained racism, homophobia, and anti-transgender beliefs which dominate her interaction with her family and the world.   The transgender child, “Sammy”, reacts not strongly enough to either the anti-trans or racist sentiments of her family and embraces their intolerances to get acceptance.  The son, “Jimmy”, brings his black girlfriend home for Thanksgiving, without anyone ever having met or talked to her and while knowing of his family’s racism.  It appears he is more interested in showing up his family than loving his partner.  “Grace”, Jimmy’s girlfriend, is the Black fundamentalist Christian, homophobic, anti vax and racist daughter of a preacher.  She resents anyone whose behavior is not “proper” while being pregnant and not married.  But Crone has them pass around a pinecone and state what they are thankful for so they can conclude the play with a “lovefest”.  A moment of understanding, in Crone’s world, overcomes all evil.

What would this play be if Donja R. Love was asked to write it with the same character descriptions?  “Grace” would replace “Rosalie” as the main character, but he would not treat her kindly.  Each character would own their own needs and reject the others for their prejudices.  There would be no lovefest, but the audience would have left satiated with a Thanksgiving feast.