Director Lucia Bellini’s talented direction and a fine group of actors has given Naya James Sonnad’s 60/40 the pacing that makes this piece an entertaining watch even as it needs much work. The use of multimedia, especially during the set changes, helps hold the audience’s interests and distract from the fact that the set changes are too long and unnecessary to advance the plot.

Sonnad’s play on space colonization suffers from the problems that virtually all space colonization plays (and movies) suffer from. Star Trek has been successful for 60 years because it avoided the problem of colonization. Almost all the shows and movies were about exploration and visiting already established civilizations. Even Deep Space Nine was a space station and not a colony. Colonization presents an author with two significant problems. First, “settlers” will be chosen using eugenics – age, education, skills, health, breeding – will be some of the main criteria. There will be “workers” which will be anyone from janitors to engineers and doctors and security (Ben in Sonnad’s play) will migrate, but their reproductive “rights” and living choices will be controlled by the ruling class (read wealthy). The second, is that most of these entertainment efforts revolve around the idea Earth is or is becoming uninhabitable. Of course, if Earth has the resources and means to make an uninhabitable planet habitable, then Earth has the means to rehabilitate itself at much lower price.

The second problem can never be justified, if the intention is to do more than plunder resources from the “new” land. The first problem is more difficult to deal with because the author must make a political and moral choice that they are seldom ready to make (AI authors face the same problem but seem more ready to reach a conclusion). Sonnad, to her credit, recognizes the first problem, but is only willing to come up with a wishy-washy conclusion. Dr. Morgan, who spearheads the colonization technology, recognizes that the government (controlled by the corporations) only want the colony to protect their own interests. But he is unwilling to destroy his work and instead engages in several small sabotages that will only delay colonization. Embracing and dealing with the eugenics “problem” is not something that Sonnad is willing to deal with directly and she needs to do so to make this a significant piece.

Currently, there are too many characters and too little plot development. Charlie, the adulterous, video game playing ne’er do well, Noelle, the conscience of the piece, Ben, the security officer, June, the grandmother who will not be selected to go and wants to stay with the grave of her husband and son all do nothing to focus the story. Only, Sameera, the engineer’s wife, Dr. Morgan, the engineer and Minister Turner of the current characters belong on stage. Sonnad also needs to put the child of Sameera and Dr. Morgan on stage to get laser focus on the eugenics issue. The video characters, the Newsman, Reporter Sally, the President also need to remain in a reconstituted play. Then she needs to determine who her protagonist is going to be – Sameera, Dr. Morgan or even Minister Turner (if she concludes eugenics is good). Once she decides on her protagonist then she can deal with both the eugenics and colonization problem and do the thing that she has not yet addressed – draw a conclusion.