Under the Hush Law, each person may speak just 140 words a day. Every word counts, numbers included. What follows is a transcript of discussion by reviewers Scott Sneddon and Arpita Ghosal following Friday’s opening of Theatre Aurinko’s Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons.
Friday
1. The car, heading home.
SCOTT: 139.
ARPITA: 139. Well? Verdict?
SCOTT: Easily one of the best shows we’ve seen this year.
ARPITA: Agree. Wow. Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons …
SCOTT: Five words on just the title?
ARPITA: It deserves them. We obsess about the word count, but it’s really an immersive, multi-layered, emotionally resonant and artistically complex study …
SCOTT: … of modern relationships. The kind where a couple pass much of their waking time in different work-related activities (she’s a lawyer, he’s a musician).
ARPITA: Yes!
SCOTT: All those scenes! Dunderstand …
ARPITA: Stealing their shorthand already? “I don’t understand,” two words cheaper …
SCOTT: Dozens and dozens! Some just fifteen seconds long. Each a new day, new fight, new snack …
ARPITA: They meet at a pet cemetery. Then months on, mid-argument. Then back again.
SCOTT: You spend the evening mentally assembling pieces into place. Recalibrating and assessing.
ARPITA: So demanding for the actors!
SCOTT: But they use these lightning-fast scene changes exquisitely…
ARPITA: … to reveal their individual personalities AND their shared love.
Blackout.
2. Nearly home.
ARPITA: 70. Lara Lucia. Her Bernadette has a guarded gravitas … a latent fear. Then one glance, one smile … and she opens up wonderfully.
SCOTT: 58. And Jack Copland?
ARPITA: His Oliver is impish and warm, vulnerability on the surface. We fall fast, so his silences land harder.
SCOTT: Together, Lucia and Copland make you believe, root for them … invest in unravelling their story.
ARPITA: Parsing their word-spending like tea leaves …
SCOTT: Or like a predictive data set. Will they last? I wanted them to, badly. Still do.
ARPITA: Me too.
Blackout.
3. Our kitchen.
SCOTT: 23.
ARPITA: 22. That’s their greeting. Numbers instead of hello.
SCOTT: So nobody wastes their last few words on—
ARPITA: Pleasantries. Or unfinishable thoughts.
SCOTT: Brutal, but smart. I started counting along with them, hoping they’d spend well.
ARPITA: They usually did. But the play knows language isn’t only functional.
SCOTT: Bed. Now.
Saturday
1. Breakfast.
ARPITA: 139.
SCOTT: 139. Director Bonnie Duff.
ARPITA: Her first full-length production as director. You’d never guess. She lets the jokes land without squeezing them too hard. She also trusts the quiet.
SCOTT: All those scene changes could have been a slog. Instead, they tick like a heartbeat.
ARPITA: Metronomic. And yet never mechanical.
SCOTT: And the actors use every single snippet. A habit of hers. A joke of his. A look they share.
ARPITA: Exhausting work for just two people. They make it look effortless, night after night.
Blackout.
2. Afternoon.
ARPITA: 95. Kenzia Dalie’s apartment set gives this whole relationship room to breathe.
SCOTT: 101. Never cramped, even in Assembly Theatre’s snug confines. Room for them to enter, exit, face off, or sit side by side …
ARPITA: And they’re ALWAYS eating something new.
SCOTT: A whole relationship told in—
ARPITA: Snacks. So many snacks.
Blackout.
3. Evening.
ARPITA: 73. The singalong.
SCOTT: 74. They blow a whole day’s words on one shared, silly song. Pure joy.
ARPITA: I wanted to join in (love that song). It’s the happiest they ever sound.
SCOTT: Creativity loves constraint. Paradoxically, the limit is what gave them that joy.
ARPITA: Then that brilliant argument over “really”…
SCOTT: Words drifting from meaning while we watch. “Love you” wearing down from use.
ARPITA: But notice? Some flashbacks, before the word count law, were semi-silent. Some lovely silences.
SCOTT: Others more damning. Words withheld without compulsion.
ARPITA: And the count lets them fool themselves. “Out of words” becomes an excuse.
SCOTT: We’d never do that.
ARPITA: Never. Obviously. Bernadette’s a lawyer, though. Makes a living talking all day in court.
SCOTT: Oliver’s a musician and activist.
ARPITA: Words are critical to both their livelihoods.
SCOTT: But as we see, when simple survival and societal change both cost words …
ARPITA: 2.
SCOTT: 6. Oh! Save me some tomorrow, please. Goodnight.
ARPITA: Goodnight, love.
Sunday
1. Morning. Deadline tonight.
SCOTT: 139. What were we discussing… how when words cost– The politics.
ARPITA: 139. … honesty becomes a luxury only the rich — who have lots and want “more of the same” — can afford. It’s Maslow’s hierarchy, rationed daily … lurking halfway between backdrop and foreground, which is exactly right.
ARPITA: 139. Bernadette’s a lawyer. Makes a living talking all day in court.
SCOTT: Oliver’s a musician and activist.
ARPITA: Words are critical for both.
SCOTT: But as we see, when simple survival and societal change both cost words, honesty become a luxury only the rich — who have lots and want “more of the same” — can afford.
ARPITA: It’s Maslow’s hierarchy, rationed daily … lurking halfway between backdrop and foreground, which is exactly right.
SCOTT: Steiner never lectures, lets the word count show who can afford to speak.
ARPITA: Oh, and gender.
SCOTT: Who’s expected to hold back words? Who’s expected to fill the silence? Who’s allowed to keep it?
ARPITA: Exactly the questions it leaves you with.
SCOTT: Steiner wrote Lemons over a decade ago. Feels like it was written this week.
ARPITA: Because noise everywhere keeps rising … and important things go unsaid. The real question it makes us ponder is what people aren’t saying.
SCOTT: Politicians. Partners. All of us … me included, apparently.
ARPITA: Apparently so.
Blackout.
2. Afternoon.
SCOTT: 75. Plenty of “zest” in these Lemons. The play is frequently genuinely funny.
ARPITA: 75. Two qualifier adverbs, really? Yes — Duff cast for comedy, and it pays off handsomely. The laughs make the dystopia hit harder.
SCOTT: Since Friday I’ve noticed every word I waste. Mostly qualifiers.
ARPITA: I’ve noticed you noticing. You’ve gone very quiet at breakfast.
SCOTT: Saving them for you.
ARPITA: Spend them on me, then.
SCOTT: Every couple rations something: time, attention, patience. The Hush Law makes the rationing audible. Intentional. Deliberate.
ARPITA: So, readers: go. It closes on the fifteenth, and tickets are well under forty dollars.
SCOTT: Bring someone you love. Count what you say on way home. Create space to say more of it.
Blackout.
3. Filing.
ARPITA: 19. Notice something?
SCOTT: 20. Hmm? Go on.
ARPITA: First review you’ve ever filed exactly on length.
SCOTT: Because you kept finishing my sentences all weekend. That cost you.
ARPITA: I always know where they’re going.
SCOTT: Then you know the last one.
ARPITA: You love me.
He would answer. He can’t. She knows.
Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons by Sam Steiner, presented by Theatre Aurinko, runs to November 15, 2026, at The Assembly Theatre, 1479 Queen St. W., Toronto. Tickets at todocanada.ca.
© Scott Sneddon, Sesaya Arts Magazine 2026
