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The program says “Meet Me in the Nam” is about a couple's relationship, with the Vietnam War as a subtext and “an important shadow for this play.” If that's true, shadows are larger than life.

Ostensibly about a former peace activist, Katie (Tamara Miller), struggling to understand the battlefield experiences of her war-veteran husband, Doug (Tony Vita), the play becomes less about their disparate marriage and more of a 30-year-old political statement that evolves into a metaphor massacre.

Back in Vietnam, a local laundry girl (Kristine Sawyer) pesters Doug. (Tony Vita)

Ric Davidge, who spent a year in Vietnam with the First Air Cavalry, directs Connie Yoshimura's drama of a veteran whose mind returns to the jungles of Southeast Asia when he sleeps, and his wife who has no concept of his war experiences. As the show moves along it becomes political and as much about the wife, who had given up writing for the financial rewards of a law career and rediscovers her lost passion.

The play switches locations between the couple's cabin at Big Lake, Alaska and modern-day Vietnam. Doug and Katie travel to the Nam hoping it will help him come to terms with his nightmares.

Add to the mix Katie's alter ego, the Poet (Krista Schwarting), who recites drippy metaphor-laced personal poems during the numerous set changes, and Davidge has a delicate balancing act.

Miller and Vita give strong performances in a play that loses focus. The struggle to save a marriage of opposing experiences and political ideals from one of the most turbulent times in America's history is the story. But “Meet Me in the Nam” retreats from the story to rehash old anti-war arguments and promote an aspiring poet who apparently looks to “The Bridges of Madison County” for inspiration.

Meet Me in the Nam
By Connie Yoshimura
Directed by Rick Davidge