Review: "Wakey Wakey"

Will Eno’s “Wakey, Wakey,” which opened Monday night at the Signature Theatre, isn’t really a play. It’s an accounting of the things that matter in life, delivered by a man in a wheelchair who, we surmise, is fatally ill.
Presented with quiet authority and a soft, ironic humor by the remarkable Michael Emerson (“Lost”), observations that might otherwise seem random, and sentimental, coalesce into a painful but brave last embrace of ordinary pleasures.
There are baby pictures, ice cream, word games and some lessons learned. (“Push yourself a little, and go easy on yourself a little. Time is your friend, and time is your enemy. We can choose which, for a while.”)
The only other performer is January LaVoy, who appears late as an honest, deeply sympathetic caregiver.
At the end of the 70-minute production, which Eno (“The Open House”) also directed, soap bubbles float down on the audience, and there are free snacks and punch offered on the way out.
The evening gains additional poignancy if you see it as Eno’s tribute to James Houghton, the founder and artistic director of the Signature Theatre, and a mentor to Eno and other playwrights, who died last August of cancer at the age of 57.
http://www.northjersey.com/story/entertainment/theater/2017/02/27/theater-review-doctors-dilemma/98473424/