Playwright April Phillips has created a finely crafted script that serves up four vignettes on the unexpected encounters that can take place in the transient, anonymous and deeply revealing space of a cheap motel room.
The intimacy of The Basement is well suited to the human scale of the drama and Cass'n'Ova Productions has put together a highly polished production that provides opportunities for a distinguished cast to get their teeth into a variety of meaty roles with a Kiwi flavour.
The first piece teases out the tension between commercial transactions and personal tenderness, with Renee Sheridan and Coen Falke capturing the awkwardness of an anonymous liaison in which things are not always what they seem.
Sympathetic performances by Peter Hayden and Lorae Parry bring a down-to-earth quality to the elegiac reflections of an elderly couple looking back on their lives and developing an intense appreciation of what is important.
An abrupt change in tone has Ken Blackburn and Cameron Rhodes stirring up plenty of laughs as a fastidious, eager-to-please salesman exchanging small talk with a hard-case motel manager.
