Review: ‘Ideation,’ a gripping dark comedy, returns to San Francisco Playhouse

The road to hell is paved with good “Ideation” in Aaron Loeb’s darkly funny corporate thriller.

This 90-minute nail-biter, which won the distinguished Glickman Award last year, takes us inside the nebulous world of highly paid management brainstorming, where the Greek economy is pilfered, the most efficient way to dispose of millions of bodies is dissected and the ubiquitous whiteboard is soon awash in gray areas. Tautly directed by Josh Costello, this intriguing new work runs through Nov. 8 at the San Francisco Playhouse.

Conspiracy theories abound in this suspenseful drama, which examines the thorny relationship between big business, morality and American identity. While Loeb, also known for “First Person Shooter” and “Abraham Lincoln’s Big Gay Dance Party,” never intended for the play to have apocalyptic overtones, it’s that hint of a rising global menace that gives “Ideation” its bite. In a world beset by Ebola outbreaks and perpetual government surveillance, it’s hard to shake off this well-crafted cautionary tale.

Framed by the sinuous lines, cherry wood and neon of SF Playhouse co-founder Bill English’s set, “Ideation” unfolds in a posh, high-end limbo of jet setting, expense accounts and mini scones. The verisimilitude of the piece is crucial lest the narrative seem absurd, but Loeb has spent enough time in the corporate realm to nail the jargon and the rituals.

Hannah (a tart Carrie Paff) is often the smartest person in the room, but she’s also the only girl in a boys’ club, so she has to defer to Scooter (Ben Euphrat), an insufferable assistant who only got the job out of sheer nepotism.

Smug alpha male Brock (the estimable Mark Anderson Phillips) is used to taking control of any situation, breaking down any existential quandary into solvable bite sizes. Phillips can pack an encyclopedia of subtext into the stammer “so, so, so, so ….”

Sandeep (Jason Kapoor) is a Harvard-educated Indian engineer reluctant to rock the boat lest he lose his work visa. Hard-nosed Ted (Michael Ray Wisely) just wants to crunch the big data in time for his daughter’s soccer game. They all have too much skin in the game to botch a top secret project like this one.

It’s only when the specter of personal danger appears on the horizon of their cutthroat stratagems that the team begins to suspect that no one is safe from the bottom line.

Loeb has tightened the twists and turns since the play’s debut as part of San Francisco Playhouse’s Sandbox Series, and the narrative is as sly as ever. But there’s not quite enough fear amid the jocular one-upmanship, and the second half of the show spins its wheels a bit. A greater sense of possible imminent risk would heighten the play’s intensity.

Still, “Ideation” captures the power of language to conceal as much as it reveals, and that’s a potent thrill all its own. The consultants are well nigh blissful about their jobs until their carefully cultivated denial mechanisms begin to fail. That core sense of plausibility is what grounds all the chaos that comes after.

With its unsettling echoes of everything from “The Usual Suspects” to “The Walking Dead,” “Ideation” urges us to consider what we know and what we are trying hard not to know about the world we live in.

Contact Karen D’Souza at 408-271-3772. Read her at www.mercurynews.com/karen-dsouza, and follow her at Twitter.com/karendsouza4.