I recommend Rachel Bonds’s new play Jonah (currently playing at the Roundabout’s off-Broadway venue) despite the fact that it doesn’t quite work for me. But I often get something valuable out of plays that I don’t think work.

Despite the title, Jonah is not primarily about the character of Jonah. He is one of three guys the lead character, Ana, deals with during the course of the action. Jonah–naive, clumsy, endearing–is the youngest of them, someone Ana meets while in high school. Danny–troubled and edgy–is someone from her troubled family history who pops up while she is going to college. Steven–awkward and self-effacing–is someone she meets at what is likely a writers conference where she is a guest artist.

The timing jumps around a bit, and we make assumptions which are then modified as Bonds spoons out new information. By the end, we have a working concept of the shape of Ana’s life.

That Ana turns out to be a writer is a tip-off that the play probably has a fair amount of autobiographic content. Plays based in autobiography frequently confront the problem that autobiographic characters are usually reactive. They tend not to initiate dramatic action but cope with the initiatives of other characters. And that’s pretty much the case here. The set represents three different rooms at three different times, but all of the scenes are generated by one of the guys gaining access to it. So scene after scene is about whether or not she is going to allow a guy to stay and, if so, under what conditions. This can’t help but be a little repetitious.

The cumulative effect of the encounters with these guys doesn’t build to a realization that made me go “ah” as I suspect Bonds hopes. But, under the direction of Danya Taymor, the individual scenes crackle with life. If I wasn’t taken by the play’s destination, I very much enjoyed the trip. Bonds has the benefit of Gabby Beans playing what I assume to be her alter ego. Though the various scenes are set so that Ana responds to the guys’ initiatives, Beans plays her so assertively that she never slips into passivity. Jonah establishes that Gabby Beans probably can commandingly play anything a writer could throw at her. And, even though the play doesn’t quite land for me, it makes eager to see Rachel Bonds’s next play.