Milk Like Sugar

Boston stages have two plays by "Luck of the Irish" author Kirsten Greenidge, a native of the Boston area. Now opening here as part of a rolling world premiere -- and as part of the New Repertory Theatre's Next Rep Black Box Festival -- is "Baltimore." The other is "Milk Like Sugar," Greenidge's play from 2011 that is based on a true story -- reportedly mistaken as a "pregnancy pact" -- of how a number of students at an area high school became pregnant within a short space of time in 2008.

In real life, 18 students got pregnant, and there was no agreement among them to do so. But in turning life (and media blather) into art, Greenidge has embraced the idea of just such a pact taking place among three high school girls, best friends since childhood who have now turned 16 and believe themselves to be adults ready for motherhood.

Of course, they are still children themselves, and far from prepared for the responsibility of having children of their own. But the girls have an idea that their babies will be cuddly, and affectionate, and little trouble to care for -- in fact, as the play opens, they are chattering with wild excitement about how they intend to dress the infants in designer clothing, thus making the babies into accessories to their glamorous mothers. The designer outfits, the girls believe, will be provided by well-wishers who attend the baby shower they plan to host as an expectant trio.

Already carrying a child is Margie (Carolina Sanchez), a Hispanic girl who looks as though she just had her quinceanera last week. Margie seems down to earth and level-headed, despite her unrealistic ideas of what motherhood will mean. Talisha (Shazi Raja) -- or T, as she'd prefer to be known -- is quite different: Bossy, dominating, a little mean, and quite self-involved, Talisha seems like the leader of the group, and her level of self-possession makes her involvement with a considerably older man seem less a surprise than it otherwise might be.

Of the three, Annie (Jasmine Carmichael) is the lone virgin. She doesn't even have a boyfriend -- which is a serious impediment to the plan, especially given the need for haste (Margie is already eight weeks along). Not to worry, though: Annie's friends have already identified a likely candidate for stud service -- an academically ambitious boy named Malik (Marc Pierre), who has plans to escape the underclass by earning a spot at a good college.

The girls like to chat while gathered at their lockers at school, or getting tattoos from a fellow named Antwoine (Matthew J. Harris), who is only now learning his craft, and so willing to put ink to skin for free. These environments come complete with other influences -- Antwoine is an artist, and his concerns with ink colors, form, and the living canvasses his clients offer him constitute the whole of his concerns. By contrast, Keera, a dowdy classmate T bullies into agreeing to do her homework, is irrepressible about her faith, preaching the power of prayer and sacred family bonds to anyone willing to listen -- and anyone not willing to listen, but lingering within earshot. It's these influences, plus Malik's love of astronomy -- that is, his willingness to look beyond his immediate surroundings -- and his corresponding desire to get out into the wider world, that Annie starts to factor into her thinking.

Margie and T -- especially T -- have locked onto their plan as necessary and even, in a sense, ethical; when Annie wavers, T accuses her of not having the guts to follow through on her commitment, to say nothing of living up to her obligations as a friend. It's obvious to us -- and to Annie, too, we start to think -- that T isn't nearly as self-assured as she seems; in fact, her bullying starts to seem like the badge of someone deeply insecure. (Subsequent developments in her relationship with the mysterious older man only reinforce this.)

Her curiosity piqued and her mind churning, Annie approaches her mother, Myrna (Ramona Lisa Alexander) for advice, and she gets it only in the breach. Myrna is full of regrets and blame for factors outside of herself for the fact that she works as a janitor when she fancies herself a writer. In fact, she blames Annie and Annie's two brothers for much of her discontent -- something that Annie discerns, and which causes her to reconsider the whole idea of following through with the pregnancy pact, given that her mother was in junior high school when she gave birth to the first of her brood. What if, Annie asks, there is some other way to live her life than early motherhood? A more "excellent" way? It might lie with the religious devotion that Keera displays, or be found through Malik's poetic way of thinking. It might even prove to be accessible with the right tattoo.

"Milk Like Sugar" is a 90-minute blaze that gains heat and ferocity as the play continues. There is no intermission to interrupt its momentum. The production demonstrates excellence in every facet -- from Cristina Tedesco's scenic design (which relies on colorful swathes of paint that represent the cheery environs of a school but also suggest the graffiti-tagged walls of the neighborhoods where the girls live) and M.L. Dogg's sound design to M. Bevin O'Gara's fluid direction, the performances from the excellent cast, Junghyun Georgia Lee's street-wise, so-fresh costuming, and Wen-Ling Lio's lighting scheme.

The central metaphor is a little unclear -- it seems to refer to powdered milk, and to processed food, all of which suggests that these girls live in urban food deserts where bodily sustenance and intellectual nutrition are both lacking -- but the writing is this play's main engine. Like an elephant that's only in the room like a massive ghost, there and yet not exactly tangible, Greenidge's thesis informs the piece from start to finish, only occasionally peeping out to stare at us directly, as when Myrna declaims that sex ed is something schools should stay out of and leave to the parents. Complex, interlocking, multigenerational skeins of dysfunction are palpable here, but they don't smother the play's narrative momentum or its dramatic fire; still, for all its brio -- and its smart, unrelenting capper of an ending -- this is a play that you might walk away from feeling both dazzled and depressed.

"Milk Like Sugar" continues through Feb. 27 at the Boston Center for the Arts. For tickets and more information, please visit http://www.huntingtontheatre.org