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Keith Huff's gripping crime drama 'Six Corners' poses difficult questions

“Six Corners” - ★ ★ ★

In the opening moments of “Six Corners,” by Arlington Heights native Keith Huff, a gruff Chicago detective working the late shift talks by phone with his 8-year-old son.

The unseen child asks his father if they live in a just or unjust world. The question, which goes unanswered, reverberates over the course of Huff's discomforting yet gripping drama in its world premiere at American Blues Theater.

Directed with a knowing eye and little fanfare by Gary Griffin, the 90-minute drama marks the third in Huff's Chicago cop trilogy, which began with 2007's “A Steady Rain” at Chicago Dramatists. “The Detective's Wife,” also directed by Griffin, followed in 2011 at Writers Theatre in Glencoe.

Now comes “Six Corners,” a police procedural involving flawed, frustrated officers and equally flawed, frustrated civilians. They all negotiate thorny professional and personal partnerships while grappling with grief, regret, mistrust and truth.

The title refers to the intersection of Irving Park Road and Milwaukee and Cicero avenues in Chicago's Portage Park neighborhood, home to the police station where most of the action unfolds.

Homicide witnesses Amanda Brackett (Brenda Barrie) and Carter Hutch (Manny Buckley) wait to be interviewed by detectives in Keith Huff's police procedural "Six Corners" at American Blues Theater. Courtesy of Michael Brosilow

It's evening and detectives Nick Moroni (Peter DeFaria, who co-starred in “A Steady Rain”) and Bernadette Perez (Monica Orozco) are investigating the shooting death of a CTA worker at a nearby El platform.

They share the weariness and cynicism that comes from having spent much of their time dealing with the worst people and people at their worst. Both officers have been dogged by charges of racism, brutality and sexual harassment. Each has a less-than-ideal marriage. The two also share a terrible secret related to Moroni's shooting of an unarmed teenager, whose vaping device Moroni mistook for a firearm. A dead teen and a planted weapon meant they kept their jobs.

But tension remains. And contrary to their supervisor's insinuation, it has little to do with sexual attraction. The suggestion that it does rings false and comes across as an unnecessary contrivance. Not every contentious relationship between a man and a woman results from unresolved sexual attraction.

Down and out B.J. Lyles (Byron Glenn Willis) befriends a lost little girl (Lyric Sims) in American Blues Theater's "Six Corners." Courtesy of Michael Brosilow

While the detectives work to identify the victim in their current case, expectant mother and waitress Amanda Brackett (Brenda Barrie) and Carter Hutch (Manny Buckley), a law student who works nights as a watchman, wait to be interviewed. Both witnessed the murder and together hoisted the victim from the El tracks onto the platform, where he died.

Huff juxtaposes police station scenes with flashbacks of B.J. Lyles (Byron Glenn Willis), a homeless, petty offender, and Katie (the beguiling Lyric Sims), a little girl who encounters B.J. at a bus stop after she and her mother got separated in a department store.

To reveal more would spoil a well-plotted, neatly ambiguous play in which the truth isn't always apparent and first impressions aren't always accurate.

In the program notes, Huff writes that his inspiration for “Six Corners” came from a real-life homicide he witnessed years ago on a CTA platform. Clearly Huff, who married into a law enforcement family, knows his way around a cop drama. And while the story is stuffed with details delivered so fast we can barely digest them, Huff's familiar but stylized dialogue reflects a keen ear for police patois. Moreover, his compromised but not entirely incorrigible characters have depth, which Griffin's cast ably conveys.

Detectives Nick Moroni (Peter DeFaria), left, and Bernadette Perez (Monica Orozco), center, interview witness Carter Hutch (Manny Buckley) in American Blues Theater's "Six Corners" by Arlington Heights native Keith Huff. Courtesy of Michael Brosilow

The acting is substantial, the performances authentic. DeFaria, whose role fits him like a glove, brings a rueful, guilt-tinged resignation to Moroni. Orozco reveals in the battle-tested Perez, an Afghanistan War veteran, a detective with a steel spine and a mind still troubled by past mistakes.

Both Buckley and Barrie are terrific as people more troubled than they appear. And the understated Willis strikes all the right notes as a man with a checkered past trying to do the right thing.

As for the question from his son that Moroni failed to address, “Six Corners” provides a sobering answer, just not the one we hoped to hear.

<b>Location:</b> American Blues Theater at Stage 773, 1225 W. Belmont Ave., Chicago, (773) 327-5252 or americanbluestheater.com

<b>Showtimes:</b> 7:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday; 2:30 p.m. Sunday; through March 24. Also 7:30 p.m. March 5 and 21; 3 p.m. March 3, 17 and 24. No 7:30 p.m. show March 24

<b>Tickets:</b> $19-$49

<b>Running time:</b> About 90 minutes, no intermission

<b>Parking:</b> $12 valet, metered street parking available

<b>Rating:</b> For adults, contains mature subject matter, sexual situations, strong language

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