Everybody has at least one in their life. It’s the guy who can—and too often does—recite all the inane, esoteric, and occasionally classic one-liners from the iconic movies of generation X. He’s tedious, this guy. But you keep him around like a party favor, breaking him out every once in a while if only for the entertainment value. Question is, What happens when you get two of these yahoos together?
     Contrived Ending, an original work by Denver’s own Josh Hartwell, attempts to answer that question in a tragi-comedy drama about carpe diem conundrums and the cost of living a life less worthy. Reconciling that cost may not always be pretty, it may even be as pat as the play’s title suggests. Still, this drama suggests, sometimes you just got to pony up, damn the consequences.
     The play pits old friends-cum-nemeses, Jack (Matthew Mueller), the happy-go-lucky theater dork who can quote the entirety of The Breakfast Club, and Nathan (Jeremy Make), the unhappy-go-lucky theater dork who can quote the entirety of The Breakfast Club. Together, they redraw old battle lines, fight over the girl, and eventually make the effort to forge a new alliance from the fire of ancient rivalry. And yes, they spend an inordinate amount of time reciting all the inane, esoteric, and occasionally classic one-liners from the iconic movies of generation X. This even works those moments when the dialogue remembers to untangle itself from its own cleverness.
Problem is, quoting iconic films do not a real life make. Nor does it lend itself to staging a full play.
     Jack takes his proud soliloquies as destiny. He would rather play pretend in the fictional world of film than face his own reality as a loser concessionaire at a random, artsty movie house—the kind where nobody goes to watch the films critics say you must see.
     Nathan, dour and morose—also a loser concessionaire at the same nowhere theater—makes a good foil for his puppy-like friend. He knows movies but takes his vast and useless store of lore about all things film as a foot grinding on the back of his life’s neck. He wants to be the one creating films, not regurgitating them. It doesn’t help that this film-school dropout has to suck up to his idiot boss who couldn’t tell you the difference between Eraserhead and a lead pencil.

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     Worse, he’s got eyes for Laurel (Jamie Ann Romero), the semi-attached ticket taker. But so does Jack. If he can manage not to put out to stud for his wonderfully bitchy Barbie-doll vixen manager, Wendy (Rhonda Lee Brown), who’s busy humping her way through the staff, he just might save his integrity, if not his contentment.
     Should any of this sound like drama at the drama, you’re not far off. The tensions here work because the characters and their attendant problems refuse to resolve themselves—even when tragedy strikes. And the “Karaoke” swan song scene is worth the price of admission alone.
     But too many times the too-snappy dialogue weighs the whole production down—feels, ahem, contrived. Film dorks occasionally reciting the judicious movie quote works because, again, everybody has one of those guys in their lives. But trying to build a play around that is a conceit hard to hold for four acts.

Plays through March 15 at the Buntport Theater, 717 Lipan St. Tickets are $18 ($16 students/seniors). Thursday tickets are two-for-one.  Call (303) 601-2640 for more details.