Honestly, this might be the best piece of theater I’ve seen in years, on or off the Fringe stage. Everything about Khalil and Ella’s performance is razor sharp, from the physical comedy to the incisive dive into domesticity to the startling depth of heartbreak (be it over a skunk or the car the skunk pissed on). My only regret is that there are only two more performances for folks to catch.

–DOUGLAS W. MILLIKEN, PortFringe 2019 Review Team

“Does skunk spunk peel paint?” How’s that as a premise for an hour long play? Apparently, when you have as much talent and charisma as Ella Moch and Khalil LeSaldo of the 2 Sheets Theater Company, you can put up a play about anything and people will love it. I loved Deep as Hell: The Skunk Cycle, and so did an enthusiastic audience on the closing day of a wildly successful 2019 Portfringe Festival. Somehow, from copious riffs about skunk humping, the show takes us deep as hell into the intimate struggles of its human and skunk protagonists until we end up wondering, (spoiler alert) “Why am I tearing up about this dead skunk who left her mate and pups to pursue a deeper life? Was that the right thing to do? Fulfillment or compromise, which is the right path? Are they mutually exclusive? What does it mean to listen and to love? And how do you wash skunk jizz off your car?” Maybe I’m just a sap, but I am grateful for the chance to see artists from near and far do ridiculous things just for the fun of it, and to do them beautifully. This is Fringe. Really good Fringe. See you next year.

–MARK SHAUGHNESSY, PortFringe 2019 Review Team

As a child I held a guinea pig at the pet store; a cute and cuddly football of purr. It was only after I put her back into the straw that I noticed the inch-long cuts on the delicate skin of my wrists. This is The Skunk Cycle: the disguised humanity of the skunk laying in the cut, waiting to sneak into the safehouses of your grief and loss. A funny, powerful, deftly written play.

–ASHLEY KOTZUR, PortFringe 2019 Review Team