So what exactly is “dry powder”? Those involved in the world of finance would recognize its “dry” definition as cash-on-hand reserves held by private equity funds (companies not listed on the stock market) that are basically waiting to be invested in new ventures or business buyouts. But as a writer, I’m always curious about word derivations – especially colorful ones like this. I discovered the term originated in the 17th century when armies kept gunpowder in reserve to fire guns and canons at a moment’s notice. The powder needed to be kept “dry” to be effective.
I love how the word’s origin lies in its use for blowing things up. Apropos to Boca Stage’s first-rate production of Sarah Burgess’s hit Off-Broadway comedy-drama, DRY POWDER, playing now through May 4 at Delray Beach Playhouse. The 2016 Laurents/Hatcher Foundation Award winner was described at the time by Time Out New York as “a lacerating dark comedy … incredibly timely.” Who could have predicted that almost 10 years after the play’s debut at The Public Theater, our current financial market mayhem would make Burgess’s play more relevant than ever as the intersection of business interests, politics, and American values are tested daily.
How did Burgess come up with the idea? Like so many aha! moments, serendipitously. While tutoring students for graduate school admissions tests, the playwright was exposed to a world where many of her students worked for investment firms like Goldman Sachs and “was fascinated by the culture of the place, by the juxtaposition of moral responsibility with bankers’ complex.” “Abstract business transactions seemed fertile ground for a satirical production,” she explained. The stars also aligned serendipitously to thrust Boca Stage founder/artistic director Keith Garsson and director Genie Croft into a flashpoint moment they could never have foreseen when choosing Dry Powder as the final play of their impressive 2024/25 Off-Broadway Series season.
stands behind seated Seth (Michael Scott Ross). Photo by Amy Pasquantonio.
Croft says this “clever, smart, witty play” features “biting insights into what truly constitutes the background of private equity. Dry Powder can refer to not only funds that are expendable, but people too. All four of the characters portrayed by this very talented cast are tripped up by flaws they are unaware of and are unwilling to change. As successful profiteers, they very well know, it’s not about right or wrong or even business ventures. It’s all about the satisfaction – and the real price – of getting the deal done.”
We get to watch up close (but at least at a personal finance distance) the three principals in a private equity firm argue about how to handle the fallout from a major public relations scandal caused by CEO and founder Rick Hannel (Wayne LeGette) throwing himself a million-dollar engagement party (complete with live elephant) on the same day that massive layoffs are announced following his company’s buyout of a national grocery chain. The partners’ creative ideas, passions, hidden motives and relationships (personal and with each other) all affect how they address the crisis. The cash-strapped company’s search for dry powder and a better public image roil in the background. One can’t help but smirk in recognition at Rick’s face-saving ploy of having his charity foundation construct a school in Bali, his honeymoon destination, in order to squash negative publicity because “All people remember is a building with your name on it.”
When it comes to high finance, there’s not a minute to lose. We are immediately thrust into the swanky, high-stakes, fast-moving world of KMM Capital Management in Midtown Manhattan, 2016. The main set is Rick’s office, with two wings – a fully stocked back-lit bar, stage left, and a smaller waiting area displaying a Chinese-lettered scroll, stage right.
The central boss’s office, where most of the action takes place, is on a high floor with tall windows overlooking a picture-perfect skyscraper skyline – thanks to scenic design by Claudia Smith (painters Josh Cohen and Caroline Macchiarola) and master carpenter Jeff Davis with technical direction by Christian Taylor, lighting design by Stevie Bleich and David Hart’s sound design. Sharp business and casual attire by costume designer Timothy Charles Bowman complete the New York vibe.
We first meet Rick, played with genuine assertiveness, occasional consideration, frustration and fits of temper – in short, a finely layered, very human performance by Wayne LeGette – seated at his large desk. He’s criticizing his company’s managing director Jenny – played with high-octane, ruthless fervor by Autumn Kioti Horne – for agreeing to give a talk to NYU students at this delicate time, and insists on hearing it first. Trust me, you’ll want to hear Jenny’s fascinating, no-holds-barred critique of her skills and position in the world, as well. Rick nixes her entire speech, still fuming from the fallout of her advice to go ahead with his extravagant engagement and the media now “pigeonholing him as an asshole.”
production of DRY POWDER by Sarah Burgess, playing at Delray Beach Playhouse
through May 4. Photo by Amy Pasquantonio.
But personally and professionally insensitive Jenny only cares about satisfying their company’s LPs (and no, it’s not “Long-Playing records.” In finance LP stands for “Limited Partnership” wherein partners invest money in a firm but don’t run its daily business and are only liable for the amount of their initial investment). If Jenny makes a mere fraction more on the dollar, she doesn’t care who, or how many, are hurt in the process. As for Rick’s expensive party, she tells her boss no one should stop him from having a party whenever he wants because, “You’ve worked 70 hours a week for 20 years.”
Rick purposely hired two opposing financial-advisors “opposites” to help him run his company: “Shark” Jenny, and the more community-oriented but also highly creative Seth who’s “good at bringing in unique deals.” Feeling perception is often all that counts, Seth did advise Rick to cancel his engagement plans. And now Rick rues his decision, making him perhaps more likely to consider acquiring the Sacramento-based, bespoke luggage company that Seth advocates as a great, cheap deal that would also help redeem their company’s image by creating more made-in-America factory jobs.
Michael Scott Ross as Seth shines in the difficult, delicately balanced task of coming across as an honest, likable person of conscience while adhering (at least at first) to corporate values and personal goals … all the while attempting to change his company’s “profit at any cost” trajectory. I don’t know how a man of his caliber keeps his equilibrium, but he manages with aplomb.
The fangs come out, however, when Seth and Jenny find themselves alone together. The way these two attack one another is so low, it just has to be funny. Bashing Jenny’s penchant for buying and instantly dismantling companies for shareholder profit, Seth calls her “a token hire with sociopathic tendencies,” adding, “I’m a leader, I have vision. You have nothing, you’re a vampire.” “I will destroy you!” she vehemently vows in return. And they still argue about who got a higher grade on the GREs!
Earlier, even though or maybe because he and his wife are expecting a baby, Seth had criticized Jenny to his boss “because she’s a woman and women who can bear children are naturally risk averse.” As for ignoring popular sentiment, he points to history, saying, “Ask France. If you go too far, you have a revolution.”
But there’s nothing either one of them can do to stop Rick from his latest deal as they wait nervously outside a Chinese business’s door. Where Rick, who’s suddenly, desperately cash poor (no explanation given) is set on recruiting a notoriously unscrupulous Chinese businessman and reputed gangster as an LP because he happens to be sitting on excessive cash with few places to put it. (He ultimately provides $228 million in dry powder.)
Now KMM Capital Management can finally seal the deal to purchase Landmark Luggage at its low asking price and have enough to sway Seth’s negotiator “friend,” chief executive Jeff Schrader (acting on behalf of the company’s retiring, 79-year-old president) with plenty left over. In yet another finely nuanced portrait, Christopher Dreeson as Jeff provides the perfect depiction of an outwardly trusting, sympathetic man who nonetheless finds himself caught in a web of poor financial decisions that put his family and his startup Sonoma Valley vineyard at risk. Will he sell out the luggage company’s employees (the same jobs he swore to protect) for his personal dream? Will Rick fire Seth when he learns he betrayed his trust (to no avail, but still…) or will he keep the brilliant summer analyst he “chose and made 10 years ago” as the more practical choice? Does everyone, everywhere, have a price?
assurances that none of his domestic luggage-company workers will lose their jobs in
the buyout. Photo by Amy Pasquantonio.
