by Neil LaBute
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Product Description
Belinda and Cody Phipps appear a typical Midwestern couple: teenage sweethearts, children, luxurious home. Typical except that Cody is black--"rich, black, and different," in the words of Belinda, who finds herself attracted to a former (white) classmate. As the battle for her affections is waged, Belinda and Cody frankly doubt the foundation of their initial attraction, opening the door wide to a swath of bigotry and betrayal. Staged on continually shifting moral ground that challenges our received notions about gender, ethnicity, and even love itself, This Is How It Goes unblinkingly explores the myriad ways in which the wild card of race is played by both black and white in America.
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Average Customer Review:
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
 Neil LaBute's America, 2007-01-14
In this play, Neil Labute anatomizes a contemporary "mixed" marriage, in the process telling us much about American love and friendship in their current forms. Though somewhat similar in its dramatic action to the romantic triangle of "In The Company Of Men," this newer work as a drama of ideas is infinitely richer. What LaBute's plot reveals throughout is that the individualism, on which so many of us pride ourselves, in its present tattered shape can in no sense be confused with mature personhood. Absent from the world of the play is any evenly diffused, widely accepted, high-minded code of manners which might mould, encourage, and restrain certain behavior patterns. Instead, each of the three characters is largely his or her own carver. Left mainly with themselves to fall back upon, the three are, in fact, ignorant of being the most miserable of creatures. Their highest idea of realizing their humanity involves various acts, real or feigned, of "defiance." In standing out by offending others, then, they chiefly live, and move, and have their being.
The few remnants of older and questionable community standards that do appear involve, first, the endorsement of working hard so as to become rich and arouse the envy of one's neighbors, and, second, the sad heritage of racism which still infects blacks and whites alike. Thus, as his m.o., Cody, the hard-working husband in the "mixed" marriage, instinctively plays the race card. Similarly, the play's narrator, Man, finds lurking just under the surface of his "educated" self an abundance of racial slurs at the ready. Each of these characters, as the closing scene reveals, even when physically together, is shockingly and sadly "alone."
Labute uses with considerable cleverness the dramatic device of a narrator who addresses us directly to put the audience in the same position toward the truth of situations that the characters often find themselves in. Forced upon us then is an awareness of the frequent opacity of one person to another at any given moment in life. I don't think the play is suggesting there is no truth in a specific situation, for if that were so it would be impossible for a character to lie. And LaBute's guys are both pretty accomplished liars. Rather the telling dramatic point, for audience and characters alike, is that in a given situation we ourselves may easily be deceived. In "Othello," Shakespeare uses Iago as liar in similar fashion. Audiences tend to take his opening remarks about bookish Cassio and ignoble Othello as true, only to be forced to radically revise what they've too quickly swallowed once these characters themselves appear on stage. In both plays, we tend not to find the characters who've been misled or lied to improbably gullible, since we may ourselves have rushed to judgment after having been told not truth but only a possibility or even a self-serving whopper.
The play, as all LaBute's works, has commendable realistic and frequently witty dialogue as well as rich literary allusiveness. "Othello,""The Scarlet Letter," and "The Mayor of Casterbridge" are mentioned in significant ways. Of all LaBute's work, this play is probably the saddest. It's vision puts me in mind of Dr. Johnson's observation that life everywhere is basically the same, featuring much to endure and little to enjoy. For Johnson, the only balm in our present situation was the comfort of love and friendship. Labute's vision seems far less consoling, for the characters in his play miss Johnson's insight, unfortunately seeing love as something one grows tired of and rightly dismisses and friendship as a means of competition.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
This is how it reads.., 2007-01-11
This is how it goes, in an entertaining play to read. However the characters seem detached from themselves their lives. Maybe that is LaButes aim, however the problem being that I never felt any real empathy for these characters, only sympathy. But again that adds something to the whole feeling of the play. Maybe this is a view of a particular type of people who live in the states. I did however like the way LaBute represented an element of the modern marriage. I enjoyed reading this play, it keep my interest, but not my heart.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
This is how it goes..., 2006-12-13
Like Mamet with Edmond, Labute takes on the difficult issue of American race relations; but that is just the tip of the iceberg. The story, as others have mentioned, involves an interracial love triangle. A headstrong, aggressive black man married to a passive white woman and the old highschool buddy of both - a white guy and our narrator - drops back into the picture. The white woman falls for the white guy (who more or less moves in with them) and the tension understandably rises. There is a twist at the end, but one which I feel has been unfairly maligned. It has always seemed to me that the point of a twist ending is to force one to re-examine all that they have just seen in a new light. In a way it gets you to view the thing twice over. This Is How It Goes, above and beyond many of Labute's other plays deserves to be read twice because there is a lot being said here by a man who so clearly deserves our attention.
6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
 Not His Best Work, 2005-12-03
I have been a fan of LaBute for many years now and have yet to dislike any of his work, but this is not a very good play. When I read a play, I try to envision how it would play out on stage. This script has little potential for making a good production. I guess this may be why it was published before anyone tried to mount a production of it. I really feels unfinished. The characters change their intentions throughout the play in an attempt to create twists and turns in the plot. To me it all seems pretty contrived. Since the plot is pretty much a mess, LaBute uses the convention of the main character breaking the fourth wall and talking directly to the audience. This results in some good monologues (possible audition material), but the play itself just kind of fizzles out into these kind of monologues instead of having a real arc to the story. The dialogue is still good and there are some interesting scenes, but all-in-all it's just not a very good play. If you are a fan of LaBute and have read/seen all of his other work it may be of interest. If you are new to LaBute try The Shape of Things or The Mercy Seat.
4 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
AN EXCELLENT STORY AND PRODUCTION, 2005-05-26
I was lucky enough to see this play in production--it was an amazing cast and they served the piece very well. What a great surprise Ben Stiller was in the lead role! I thought the writing and direction were terrific; reading the script is fun because you can see many of the changes that took place during the course of rehearsals. There are some outstanding monologues (LaBute usually features those in his scripts) and it has a really fine structure, unlike anything else of his that I've read. Highly recommended!
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