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When the world feels like it’s crumbling around you, does love have the power to turn everything around? That’s the central question posed in Irish playwright Ursula Rani Sarma’s play The Magic Tree, making its U.S. debut at Keegan Theatre as part of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival. The action revolves around two characters, a lonely man in search of any form of human connection and a woman so frustrated with the state of her life that she wants to disappear, who meet in an abandoned home. At first, they find themselves drawn together and slowly begin opening up to one another but soon enough, their dark sides are revealed and the attraction that once simmered goes away. Its meet-cute opening might make it look like a romantic comedy but Sarma, a playwright celebrated in Ireland and the U.K. but little known in the U.S., forces her audience to look at the darker side of the human condition. The play runs Oct. 10 to Nov. 17 at Keegan Theatre, 1742 Church St. NW. $25–$36. (202) 265-3767. keegantheatre.com.