Joe's View

Playwright Geoffrey Nauffts carves out new theatrical turf in his play “Next Fall,” a hit off-Broadway last year that is now in previews for a Broadway opening next week.

Nauffts zeroes in on a few topics that rarely come up among sophisticated Manhattan folk — belief in God and acceptance of the notion of sin.

“Next Fall” is an issue play, but the writer tells the story with such wit and humanity that the debates that erupt in the course of the story seem real and worth talking about.

Nauffts tracks the relationship that develops between a seeming mismatched gay couple — 40ish Adam (Patrick Breen, above right), who thinks religion is a foolish and dangerous crutch designed to make him feel guilty about his sexuality; and twentysomething Luke (Patrick K. Heusinger, above left), a very active gay man (originally from Florida) who nevertheless believes his lifestyle is a sin.

Adam doesn’t understand how Luke can fall in love with another man — and move in with him — if he believes what he is doing is wrong in the eyes of his deity.

Luke explains that everyone sins, but that with prayer and “acceptance” of Christ he will go to Heaven when he dies. Luke worries that most of his Manhattan friends will spend eternity burning in Hell.

Nauffts mines a lot of comedy out of the reaction of Adam and his close friend Holly (Maddie Corman) to Luke’s seemingly contradictory belief system. It is to the writer’s credit that he takes the younger man’s faith seriously (although all of the best lines go to Adam in his role as the cynical doubter).

“Next Fall” cuts back and forth from a hospital where Luke is being treated after a serious accident — he’s in a coma and the prognosis is not good — to scenes showing us how the two men met and began living together.

The accident brings Luke’s divorced parents into the picture — Butch (Cotter Smith) and Arlene (Connie Ray) — who start off as somewhat caricatured religious Southerner targets for Adam and Holly’s witty scorn, but who deepen as the play progresses.

Luke has never told his parents that he’s gay — he assures Adam in one of the flashback sequences that he will tell them “next fall” when his younger finally goes off to college, but he keeps delaying the revelation.

More than a few of the people who comment on the volatile Broadway chat room, All That Chat, have questioned the wisdom of moving “Next Fall” to Broadway, but the show played like gangbusters at the Monday night preview performance.

Nauffts is one of the writers for the ABC series “Brothers and Sisters” and he has constructed a slick and very entertaining mainstream play with six terrific roles that are played to the hilt by a strong cast.

Patrick Breen is a theater and TV veteran who takes the central role in this comedy-drama and runs with it.

Adam’s sarcastic humor and his continuing aggravation with the belief system of the man he loves power some of the best moments in “Next Fall” — Breen’s timing and his ability to quickly shift gears from comedy to drama anchor the whole play.