Lawson Taitte

FORT WORTH – "We are the pages written in the book of God's mind."

So says a character in Sonnets for an Old Century. Michele Rene plays her in FireStarter Productions' revival of its prize-winning version of Jose Rivera's arresting collection of monologues, which opened Thursday at Circle Theatre.

Superficially, Ms. Rene's monologue is about a black mother outraged that the principal of the magnet school in which she has placed her son opens the school year with a warning about bringing guns to school and being alert to drive-by shootings in the neighborhood. Really, though – like the rest of Mr. Rivera's play – it's about humanity's occasional brush against the eternal and the ecstatic.

Each of the 15 characters is getting a chance to sum up his or her life at the moment of death. The play remains agnostic about heaven and hell, but each of these figures is going through something like judgment day. Michael Muller, for instance, portrays a rationalizing old sinner who admits to having sex with women – but denies he ever coveted them.

This new version of Sonnets for an Old Century marks the beginning of FireStarter's residency at Circle. This year the young company, formerly based at Texas Christian University, is performing two plays in Circle's basement space in downtown Fort Worth. FireStarter producing artistic director Jaime Castañeda will also direct at least two shows in Circle's regular season.

Mr. Rivera's edgy script seemed to be strong stuff for some in the audience on Thursday. Several patrons in an all-too-small audience exited early, perhaps prompted by the frank talk about sexuality and a variety of four-letter words. It's sad, particularly because the trendy urban surface of Sonnets hardly bothers to camouflage its searching spirituality.

The lineup of actors Mr. Castañeda has assembled from all over the country is even stronger than last year's group. Occasionally the Circle space, much more intimate than TCU's Hays Theatre, makes the grand scale of some of the performers look exaggerated. But the best work here (not to speak of the strong writing) makes this a must-see for those who missed it the first time around – as long as they are relatively open-minded.