Nesting: Vacancy gets the allure of the binge-watch. When I stepped into the Shoebox Theater last Saturday to catch episodes one and two of the new serialized production, I joined an audience packed with people electing to see the show’s entire four-episode arc in a single stretch (not a bad choice for a day with 100 percent projected precipitation). Seats were saved. Seats were taken. A couple obviously on a date had to sit diagonally from one another!
There’s a lot going right in Nesting: Vacancy. For the size of the space—and the relative physical agility required to get into some of the corner riser seats—the play really works the Shoebox. The stage design is creepy as hell: a web of wooden boards fixed at eerie angles meant to suggest the rotten planks of an abandoned house. The planks are an homage to the first season of Nesting, when the stage was piled with cardboard moving boxes. I didn’t see the first Nesting season, which debuted in March 2016, so a lot of crossover between the two productions is guesswork—but I did talk to the show’s co-producer, Natalie Heikkinen, to make sure I was getting my themes right.
