We Three at The Side Project

Chicago Tribune - Somewhat Recommended

"...If this were a television show like "Twin Peaks," we would have the benefits of creative editing and cinematography to make the outside world - the isolation, the cold - its own character. In this hyperintimate staging, we only have the interactions of the characters to help us figure out what happened, and more importantly, why we should care about who these people are."

Chicago Reader - Somewhat Recommended

"...A girl has gone missing in the woods. The inhabitants of her small town search for the girl's body while simultaneously hunting for meaning within their own lives. As Dustin, the too-quiet loner who was one of the last to see the girl, Adam Shalzi walks the right balance between compelling and creepy. As an actor, Shalzi's subtleties culminate in his face, a beaked thing that pitches forward, challenging everyone he points it at to a kind of emotional duel. Unfortunately, the play itself doesn't rise to the challenge—the ending is muddied and resorts to shallow spooks in lieu of deeper character digging."

Time Out Chicago - Recommended

"...The mystery of the play isn’t what happened, but what’s happening. Mary Hamilton’s eerie, slow-burn script presents any number of threads to follow as it unfolds—is this a ghost story? A psychological thriller? A whodunit? Or just the story of three lonely, strange people? The uncertainty is held together by an ironclad structure, where scene configurations take place in precisely the same sequence throughout the show (Dustin and Daisy, Grace at home, Daisy at the doctor, Dustin at Grace’s home, Dustin and Daisy, Grace at Home...and so on). Like a metronome, We Three steadily ticks away while inviting rampant speculation aided by a few creepy twists. The repeating scenes, while sometimes contributing to the show’s snail's pace, also make its ideas and strange implications accessible—something often not true of plays this cold—and propel a story that purposefully grants no implicit direction."

Around The Town Chicago - Highly Recommended

"...In my mind, the key to understanding the play is the eponymous Christmas Hymn (this play is set in February: nowhere near Christmas or even the Feast of the Epiphany) which Grace (Anne James) hums for comfort: “We Three Kings of Orient are, bearing gifts we traverse a far.” Gifts by each of the three main characters in this play are sought and denied, offered and rejected, given and inefficacious. They are things as tiny as a meal, biscuit, or even a piece of soap. As the play opens, Dustin (Adam Shalzi), a lonely and awkward young man, is making dinner for his only friend Daisy (Stevie Chaddock) whom he loves and on whom he has a slight crush. She complains that he keeps ruining her eggs, mocks his dirty nails (he has a green thumb and works as a gardener even in dead winter), and tells him that he will never find a girl."