Bekah Brunstetter’s 21st century ‘Lysistrata’

“The Game,” a new play by the acclaimed comedy writer and playwright Bekah Brunstetter is delighting Horizon Theatre audiences with a cast that Arts ATL said brings “more chemistry than a hydrogen-bomb.”

In “The Game,” a group of frustrated couples tackle video game addiction, wreaking havoc with attempted “sex strikes” and other strategies for reconciliation. Playwright Bekah Brunstetter and Horizon Co-Artistic Producing Director Lisa Adler joined Lois Reitzes on “City Lights” to discuss “The Game” during its initial run. The play is actually an adaptation of the ancient Greek comedy “Lysistrata,” according to Brunstetter, but the strike ultimately doesn’t work in her 21st century adaption because “we have a different relationship to sex now.” The introduction of and dependence on technology has fundamentally changed our relationship with the act. “The Game” tackles those changes.

Brunstetter wrote the play “about connection and relationships and marriage and technology and the ways in which we need technology,” she says. The play’s protagonists, Alyssa and Homer are portrayed, respectively, by Jennifer Alice Acker and Chris Heck, whom reviewers have praised effusively for their chemistry and energy. “The Game” is on stage at Horizon Theatre through July 28.