Quick, think of something really humorous about vaccinations. No? Me neither, but playwright Jonathan Spector has done us all a favor and molded one of the most divisive, inane, grotesque and newly, resurgent issues of the day and polished it into a shiny, insightful and damn funny little gem so that all of us can ogle and ponder and reconsider just how in the name of Jonas Salk did we get here.

Spector’s play is called Eureka Day, opening tonight and immediately becoming one of the best productions Broadway has offered this season – and that’s really saying something, what with terrific Fall arrivals as Oh, Mary!, Death Becomes Her, Maybe Happy Ending and The Hills Of California.

Indeed, the 2024-25 Broadway season so far has been stuffed with great comedies, much more so that dramas, and Eureka Day holds its own with most of them (ok, maybe Oh, Mary! stands alone).

Not that all of Eureka Day is comedy – there’s plenty of drama here too, and genuinely insightful thoughts on the dreadful ways we speak to and treat one another these troubled days – but during the stretches where pious disagreements dissolve into the verbal equivalent of hair-pulling, well, belly laughs are on the way – and damned but you never actually see the characters delivering those lines, hiding behind the shield of their laptop keyboards as they are.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Some set-up:

Eureka Day is a very fine Manhattan Theatre Company production opening on Broadway tonight at Samuel J. Friedman Theatre. The title refers to a very fictional Eureka Day School, a private grade school set squarely at the Ground Zero of the Bay Area progressivism dismissed by some quarters as politically correct.

Says one parental newcomer to the school, “You can always spot a Eureka Day kid because at soccer games they’re the ones who cheer when the other team scores.”

Spector himself might forgive even us Broadway-goers for smirking, at least initially, at the abundant snowflakery in evidence at a first-of-the-2018-19 school year meeting of the brainy school’s board of directors, a five-member group that begins the meeting – and the play – with an excruciatingly angels-on-the-heads-of-pins debate prompted by a proposed (and very, very minor) addition to a drop-down menu on the school’s website. The fact that this very adult group meets in a warmly nostalgic grade school library flawlessly designed by Todd Rosenthal only adds to the absurdity.

Spector, his simpatico director Anna D. Shapiro and a flawless cast of five (well, six, but be surprised by the last) are too smart to promise real peace of mind from any of these divisive, squabbling, confused-by-information yet staunch in their opinions Americans. Eureka Day is too honest to coddle.

And what, we can’t help thinking, would these characters do if a true crisis were ever come to Eureka Day.

We don’t have long to wait. The surface gentility and kid glove debating, however needling, peels away like so much dried-out Elmer’s art paste when Don (Bill Irwin, as odd and captivating as ever), the good-hearted head of the school who never encountered a debate he couldn’t both-sides his way to exasperation, presents the board with a board of health letter he’s just received: Cases of mumps have been reported at Eureka Day, no doubt due to the lax vax standards the everything-to-everyone school has long embraced.

Reactions among the school leaders are, of course, varied and diverse, but not in ways you might expect.

In addition to sweet, weak Don, there’s Suzanne (Jessica Hecht, like Irwin, an actor who’s perfected idiosyncrasy as performance style), a middle-age longtime Berkeley resident, most likely rich but outwardly maintaining the vaguely hippiesh appearance and demeanor of her younger self. Mistake her for a Joni-and-granola pushover at your own risk: She’s quick-thinking, strong-willed and, when it comes to the safety of her children, tenacious as a bear.

Eli (Silicone Valley‘s Thomas Middleditch, showing a terrific range) is a mid-30s stay-at-home dad who dresses like a college student (the character-illuminating costume design by Clint Ramos is thread-perfect). Eli dotes on his (offstage) little fully-vaxed boy Tobias and remains quiet and humble about the fortune he made in San Francisco’s tech boom. As another character snipes, of course he stays at home.

Meiko (Chelsea Yakura-Kurtz), the same age as Eli (hint, hint), is the single mother of (again, offstage) little Olivia. Biracial Japanese/White (she calls herself Hapa), Meiko is, initially, the least opinionated of the group, perhaps even bored (she knits throughout meetings). But, again, watch out for first impressions.

Into this well-oiled, studied, precious little collection comes Carina (the magnificent Amber Gray of Hadestown). She and her little boy are newcomers to the school, and Carina fills a floating board seat left open each year to accommodate just such a fresh-perspective newbie. Two other things to know about Carina: She’s Black and her son was previously enrolled in (gasp) public school. The presumptions about Carina can barely be contained in one library.

Some rather abstract talk about vaccinations, all very polite, takes a turn when Meiko, arriving late for the meeting, says, with little concern, that her daughter wasn’t feeling well. “Her face is all swollen. I think maybe she’s allergic to gluten?”

So far, it’s all been polite and funny social commentary, but Eureka Day is about to go for the comedic jugular. The board decides to open up the vaccine debate to the school community at large, with the board in the library and the rest of the community’s parents joining in on livestream, their comments typed and unspooling on a laptop for the board (and large overhead projections for us).

While the online conversationalists starts off ok, if prone to off-topic rambling, they soon become laptop warriors:

Arnold Filmore: “Just answer honestly: would you rather have measles or autism?”
Orson Mankel: “Just answer honestly: were you dropped on your head as a child?“

As the discussion deteriorates into the inevitable Nazi references and foul language, the audience is torn between belly laughs and the looks of absolute horror on the faces of the genteel board members.

Eureka Day has more in store for us than laughs, though, and the second half of the play, while occasionally funny, becomes absolutely intriguing and even heart-tugging as characters we think we have pegged reveal depths we hadn’t expected. As the peacemaking Don is wont to say, there are no villains here, and try as we might to point fingers at a few, it becomes increasingly hard to do so given how expertly and compassionately the playwright written – and the top-notch cast performed – these strugglers-through-life.

Make no mistake, though: Eureka Day ultimately displays compassion for its characters, but not for the misguided, horse-blinder opinions some express. It’s unlikely RFK Jr. will be waiting in the ticket line anytime soon, but even the characters who might cheer his rise five years down the line (remember, the play is set in 2019) are afforded some grace. Of course, they don’t know what we know.

Title: Eureka Day
Venue: Broadway’s Samuel J. Friedman Theatre
Written By: Jonathan Spector
Directed By: Anna D. Shapiro
Cast: Bill Irwin, Thomas Middleditch, Amber Gray, Jessica Hecht, Chelsea Yakura-Kurtz and Eboni Flowers
Running Time: 1 hr 40 min (no intermission)