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Playwright David Lindsay-Abaire has an impressively eclectic bibliography that includes the Pulitzer prize-winning play Rabbit Hole, the Tony-winning musical Kimberly Akimbo, and providing book and lyrics for a singing and dancing version of Shrek. His new comedy The Balusters doesn’t exactly bring all of his talents together in a single sum-up work, but it does require a versatility of imagination in the pulling together the nine-member Vernon Point Neighborhood Association. Not quite as officious as an HOA but not quite as benevolent as a friendly get-together, the group assembles to discuss various issues affecting the safety, sanctity and aesthetic qualities of a neighborhood in an unnamed US area. (Based on a few stray references, somewhere around suburban DC seems likely.) They’re remarkably polite, even friendly, considering how much some of them seem to not-so-secretly dislike one another. It’s sometimes hard to tell whether they know each other too well for passive-aggressive behavior, or if Lindsay-Abaire doesn’t have quite the right ear for it.

The newest member of the group is Kyra (Anika Noni Rose), freshly moved from a Baltimore-area neighborhood where, we learn, her family’s departure was hastened by an incident with a previous neighborhood group. Kyra is well-to-do – almost anyone living in Vernon Point is – firm in her convictions, and aware, as any Black woman in her position would be, of what reactions she may inspire in her rich white neighbors. Her first order of business is to address a dangerous corner outside her house, where speeding drivers have been diverted following the installment of a new traffic light elsewhere in the neighborhood. She hopes for another light, or at least a series of stop signs; association president Elliot (Richard Thomas) insists any further change will blight the “esplanade”, as he calls it.

This is not the only neighborhood issue covered in the multiple meetings that make up The Balusters. The one that lends the play its title, for example, is a supposed problem with an unseen neighbor who has rebuilt her porch railing using historically incorrect balusters for support; some members think they should cut her some slack – the railing was rebuilt to accommodate a newly necessary wheelchair ramp, after all – while others (mainly Elliot) require more stringent enforcement. Lindsay-Abaire cleverly refracts myriad minor problems (Amazon packages stolen; dog excrement misplaced), interpersonal annoyances (an elderly woman mixing up her neighbors; an ultra-woke younger woman eager to correct any perceived micro-aggressions), and broader social concerns through a single group, with various partners, children and other important figures referred to but unseen. The only person the audience sees on stage who isn’t a member of the association is Luz (Maria-Christina Oliveras), Kyra’s housekeeper. She used to work for Elliot, but left the job under circumstances that remain mysterious until a clunky monologue later in the play.

If that all sounds a little schematic in the overall pitting of the high-achieving Black mom against the patrician white grandfather who may value historical preservation over child safety, well, you may be ready to join the fray of The Balusters, where criticisms, criticisms of criticisms, and sassy jokes about criticisms of criticisms quickly pile up. If anything, Lindsay-Abaire seems overly sold on the idea that these nine neighbors are essentially all friends, or at least trying to act like they are. It’s hard to imagine, for example, Ruth (Margaret Colin) wearing a rabbit-fur coat just to annoy vegan Willow (Kayli Carter) going over as a cute prank in the real world. This in turn makes it harder to understand why, exactly, these particular conflicts come to a more dramatic head – various prejudices and presumptions are discussed so openly and knowingly from the jump that the eventual boiling over feels more obligatory than queasily inevitable social satire. It’s harder to dramatize quiet seething, but there’s still surprisingly little of it here.

Yet there are also enough hooks in the work to make The Balusters entertaining, even in spite of itself. It’s particularly smart in its depiction (mostly, though not exclusively, through Elliot) of a softer conservatism, one that would never flirt with direct Trumpism yet has a clear sense of social order, as well as the order of operations that, say, a gay Black man like Brooks (Carl Clemons-Hopkins) must process when evaluating possible prejudices against him. Given that, the dialogue’s riffs on genuine biases and verbal sensitivities aren’t as clever or unpredictable as it should be; more often than not, supposedly cutting jokes are easy enough to anticipate. But the cast delivers those lines with such impeccable timing that they often get laughs anyway. Stage and screen veteran Marylouise Burke is particularly funny as Penny, the slightly addled but still with-it octogenarian who dutifully takes minutes at the meeting, while asking after the husband that sardonic Melissa (Jeena Yi) doesn’t actually have.

In one scene, Lindsay-Abaire makes Penny an unexpected voice of reason and grace at a point that will make some audiences wonder if she’s his stealth mouthpiece for how to best navigate a complicated world of biases, pettiness, divides in race and class, and understandable human frailties. The admirable thing about The Balusters is that it’s easy enough to wonder the same thing about any number of characters at other moments; less laudable is how often Lindsay-Abaire milks this multiplicity of sympathies for easy applause. Rather than allowing the audience to consider and challenge different points of view, he’s giving them the chance to feel righteously correct from several different angles – like when harassed-feeling white guy Alan (Michael Esper) makes an impassioned plea for allowing well-meaning people their missteps, then is rebuked by the straight-talking Latino Isaac (Ricardo Chavira). Even more egregious, several emotional turns depend on offstage action that, through its on-stage unveiling, feel like cheap gotchas. Is this a multifaceted discussion or a series of cute writers’ tricks? The Balusters feels more like the latter – which makes it both more fun and less resonant than it probably should be.