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At its heart, Aurin Squire's To Whom It May Concern is an oddball love story. The romance is set in motion when Lorenzo (Israel Gutierrez) writes a "fan letter" to Maurice (Matt Alford), a marine whose bravery while serving in Afghanistan has been widely reported in papers throughout the U.S. The relationship that develops between Lorenzo and Maurice, first via handwritten letters, then email and finally instant messages, not surprisingly is based on a misassumption that Maurice makes when reading Lorenzo's first letter which is signed simply "L.L." Maurice assumes that Lorenzo is a young woman, and Lorenzo, a nervous gay teen in Abilene, KS, does nothing to set the record straight, as it were.

From this comic premise, Squire shifts "Concern" to more dramatic ground once Maurice has landed stateside and comes to Abilene to make good on a fantasy they've typed about online. Maurice breaks into Lorenzo's bedroom – using the ladder that Lorenzo leaves outside for other reasons. – and crawls into bed with his paramour. During the course of their night together, Lorenzo and Maurice reveals scars that, while not making them necessarily the perfect soul mates, do make them kindred spirits in need of one another's friendship.

Squire's writing, on the whole, is sensitive and generally avoids melodrama, which could be an easy pitfall with a piece charged with more than a little homophobia. His portrait of Lorenzo, who's not yet 16 and suffering from ostracism both at school and home, is simultaneously warm and unflinchingly clear-sighted. Equally pungent is his depiction of Maurice, who is haunted by the legacy of his widely-reported actions on the streets of Kabul.

The actors, working within the confines of Bruce Eyster's set, which awkwardly attempts to bring Lorenzo's bedroom to life and also serve as a "split screen" when the guys are writing to one another, deliver solid performances that navigate the twists and turns of Squire's script with precision. Gutierrez is at his best when Lorenzo, who might just be too bright for his own good, is waxing blisteringly ironic. He nearly soars during some of Lorenzo's most dramatic moments, but his work is ultimately eclipsed by Alford's when Maurice describes the actual events that led to his military commendations.

Director David Gaard ensures that the piece unfolds with an amiable tautness, but there is a sense of fussiness to his staging, which could simply stem from some of Squire's overwriting of certain sequences once Lorenzo and Maurice have met. With some judicious pruning, though, "Concern" has the potential to not only be a terrific coming-of-age story (for both characters), but also a terrific piece of theater that explores how war affects some of the youngest men who have enlisted.

---- Andy Propst

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To Whom It May Concern plays at the Arclight Theatre (152 West 71st Street). Performances are Wednesday through Saturday at 8pm, and Sunday at 3pm. Tickets are $35.0 and can be purchased by calling 212-352-3101 or by visiting www.TheaterMania.com.

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