Welcome to the craziest couples’ night since George and Martha had Nick and Honey over for drinks. The play in question is “Meteor Shower,” by comic actor Steve Martin, and while “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” is all about the drama, “Meteor Shower” is a comedy through and through.

Martin’s 2016 play is onstage in an Ensemble Company production at Imagine Performing Arts Center at Oviedo Mall. If you’re looking for a break from Christmas sentimentality, this would do the trick: There’s nary a trace of mistletoe to be seen in this decidedly adults-only sex-and-relationship comedy.

“Meteor Shower” is set in 1990s California, where Norm and Corky are preparing to welcome Gerald and Laura to their home to watch a particularly intense meteor shower. The couples barely know each other: Norm and Gerald have played tennis together at a mutual club, where it appears Norm has met Laura at least once.

But they certainly have never all spent an evening together. And after the events of “Meteor Shower,” they certainly never will again.

As the tagline on the playbill notes: “The sky’s not the only thing breaking up tonight.”

Martin’s play, which moves along brightly and briskly under Gabriel Garcia’s direction, is an exercise in absurdity. I could tell you the following topics are mentioned: cannibalism, exploding head syndrome, kleptomania, eggplants, car wax, Mapplethorpe’s photography and Velcro — but none of it would prepare you for the anarchy that ensues as the plot unspools, rewinds and finds alternative story paths.

Individual moments are very, very funny, though I didn’t find the play as a whole had much to say. Don’t worry about finding a deeper meaning; just enjoy the ride. And what a ride.

Garcia has cast a quartet of bold actors in the four roles, and they deliver: Amped up, outrageous, stagily in one another’s face … and more private regions, as well. But where Garcia especially shines is how he has his actors go all in but yet retains something recognizable, something human in this cartoonish bunch of characters.

Corky and Norm (Jonna Kae Volz and Nicholas Luisi) share a rare mayhem-free moment in the Ensemble Company production of “Meteor Shower.” (Courtesy Matthew MacDermid via The Ensemble Company)

For as much as these people are ridiculous, we know their type in some way: The obnoxious blowhard, the nervous hostess, the uncomfortable flirt with passive-aggressive tendencies, the nice but slightly boring guy.

Then from that core of truth springs this nutty bunch.

Jeremy Wood and Brenna Arden are the guests; him self-absorbed, rude, always right and concealing a crack pipe for kicks, her belittling, inappopriate and flaunting a dress cut both up and down to there. These are fiercely funny no-holds-barred performances that make Jack and Karen from TV’s “Will & Grace” look like models of subtlety. And while we should recoil from these awful people, again Garcia holds the line just right in keeping us invested.

Nicholas Luisi makes a very promising Ensemble Company debut as regular guy Norm. Whether spouting couples-communication platitudes or falling under the spell of Arden’s low-cut dress, he finds the humor in each moment.

If you’re throwing a party and these two (Brenna Arden and Jeremy Wood) show up, lock the door. They play Laura and Gerald in the Ensemble Company production of “Meteor Shower.” (Courtesy Matthew MacDermid via The Ensemble Company)

But the moral, or is that amoral, center of the whole shebang is Jonna Kae Volz’s Corky. Volz does tremendous work in grounding the slightly more reserved, if no less odd, fourth member of the group so when she too crosses into the totally absurd, we’re still on her side. Her slight detached and nonchalant delivery of seeming non sequiters are just as important to the comedy — maybe moreso — than the more over-the-top shenanigans.

The meteoric mayhem plays out on a particularly handsome set by Bonnie Sprung (and boasts a fun meteor-related special effect). That glow in the sky? Well, it’s as about as far from Rudolph’s nose as you can get.

Follow me at facebook.com/matthew.j.palm or email me at mpalm@orlandosentinel.com. Find more entertainment news and reviews at orlandosentinel.com/entertainment or sign up to receive our weekly emailed Entertainment newsletter.

‘Meteor Shower’

Length: 70 minutes, no intermission
Where: Imagine Performing Arts Center at Oviedo Mall in Oviedo
When: Through Dec. 21
Cost: $18-$22
Info: imagineperformingartscenter.org/events

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2025/12/13/meteor-shower-review-orlando/