Skip to the Good Part: An I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change Review

Shelton, Connecticut’s Center Stage Theatre delivers a hilarious and slightly convicting production of I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change just in time for cuffing season. In a season when bronzed and sun drunk singles sober up in time to think more seriously on their prospects before the cold season emerges, director Justin Zenchuk stirs up audiences with a scared straight to the alter theme that challenges the impossible way we approach dating and relationships.

Joelle Cote (Woman #1), Jen Beveridge (Woman #2), Nick Nunez (Man #1), Jaxon Beirne (Man #2) fumble through a series of love woes along the relationship spectrum— from single and dating to the reflective I’ve loved and I’ve lost of old age. In the beginning, in the “get to know you” stage, there is an assortment of emotional baggage to sort. Singles are plagued with the idea that all they’ve been through is too much to connect fully with another person, and in the end, all that baggage really is, is a lived life.

Act I: Woman 2 and Man 2 intrigue us with the emotional baggage 2-step, a dance we’re all too familiar with while Woman 1 and Man 1 allow us into their insecurities with their A Stud and a Babe number. Woman 1 and Woman 2 lament through their shared misfortunes in Single Man Drought, and Man 1 and Man 2 will be boys in Why, ‘Cause I’m a Guy.

Act II flips the coin taking us from wedding vows to til death do us part, highlighting a whole new set of struggles that come with the love connection we strive so incessantly to achieve. Woman 2 and Man 1 struggle to find time for intimacy in Marriage Tango. Before witnessing Woman 2 and Man 2 try to make that connection all over again in I Can Live With That.

The four-member ensemble skillfully navigates their characters, generating a mix of poignant, chaotic, and harmonious dynamics that pulse through the production.

The 4-door rotating set design led by Scott Sheldon, with the live band upstage creates the perfect moveable backdrop for the Saturday Night Live-esque sketches. Matthew Sullivan’s sound design is a perfectly paired with the whoopsie energy of each song and skit. Justin Zenchuk's lighting design seamlessly complements the vibrantly painted doors, adding character to each cast member’s portal to the stage, and the smokey stage vignette that slightly softening the presence of the band.

I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change is the perfect production, laden with comedic brilliance and too true nuance, to kick off the autumn season. For tickets to I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, visit www.centerstageshelton.org. Showing through September 29th.