THEATER REVIEW:

Connie and Jonas are visiting their friends Matt and Suzanne in a contemporary Los Angeles setting. All are 30-somethings and seem pretty much equal. Soon, however, we realize these couples are on opposite sides of a yawning economic divide.

Their struggles — comic and dramatic, financial and emotional — are played out poignantly in a compelling world premiere production of Kate Robin’s “What They Have” at South Coast Repertory.

Robin delves into a “grass is greener” scenario in which each couple covets what the other pair possesses, be it money or the capacity to bear children. Director Chris Fields meshes these conflicting values skillfully as their paths cross and re-cross amid increasing jealousy from each side.

Connie and Jonas are the “haves,” successful in their careers as a writer and entertainment executive, respectively. Of the “have-nots,” Matt is a struggling musician, while Suzanne is a talented but luckless artist, both quite envious of the ease in which their friends seem to glide through life.

But there’s a flip side. Connie’s pregnancy must be terminated, leaving their lives devoid of meaning.

Matt and Suzanne, on the other hand, succeed in their quest for a child, but at what cost to their personal lives?

Robin blends generous helpings of humor and pathos into her involving object lesson in the pitfalls of covetous attitudes. How these couples will resolve their traumatic differences is left for the audience to guess, but Robin offers an enormous clue in her final scene.

Of the four accomplished actors involved, Marin Hinkle excels on the highest level as Connie, haunted by her failure to carry a baby to full term and desperate to conceive again. Hinkle delivers a wrenching performance, highlighted in one particular scene in which she bares her soul to Suzanne.

The latter character, skillfully interpreted by Nancy Bell, is the “furthest out” of the four, consumed by “new age” philosophy and illustrating what Archie Bunker might have called a “dingbat.” Her eccentricities mesh quite naturally with her artistic sensibilities, however, and Bell amplifies the part quite nicely.

As Suzanne’s guitar-strumming husband, Matt, chafing under economic dysfunction, Kevin Rahm delivers a strong, substantial performance. Of the four characters, his is most likely the playwright’s voice, harsh as it is, offering a caustic calmness in the midst of anguish.

Matt Letscher as Connie’s spouse, Jonas, is the coolest of the quartet, well off but hardly ostentatious, and virtually incapable of overt emotional actions. His ambivalence toward fatherhood is particularly well delivered.

Fans of TV’s “Six Feet Under” might notice a familiar ring to the characters and dialogue — Robin was the series’ writer and supervising producer. With “What They Have,” she continues her quest toward the top of the theatrical ladder.

IF YOU GO

WHAT: “What They Have”

WHERE: South Coast Repertory, Segerstrom Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa.

WHEN: 7:30 or 8 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays, 2:30 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. Sundays until May 4

COST: $28 – $62

CALL: (714) 708-5555

TOM TITUS reviews local theater for the Daily Pilot. His reviews appear Thursdays.