Alexis
Soloski

March 30, 2015

In recent years, Soho Rep has offered dramas like “Blasted,” “Born Bad,” “An Octoroon” and “We Are Proud to Present a Presentation” — tough, turbulent, troubling. But in the new show, “Washeteria,” the company is running on a much, much gentler cycle, with lots of fabric softener, too. The theater’s first all-ages play, staged in a formerly vacant storefront in South Williamsburg, “Washeteria” is the loopy creation of the terrific set designer Louisa Thompson, who developed it with the directors Sarah Benson and Adrienne Kapstein and the students of Brooklyn Arbor P.S. 414. The storefront sits on a fairly cheerless block just beyond a highway overpass. But when you step past the smashed glass door and on to the scuffed linoleum, you’re overcome by warmth and light and the fresh and gladdening smell of soap. A lightly absurdist take on a laundromat, “Washeteria” has a couple of cruddy washers and dryers, a cave of detergent bottles and a pile of unclean clothes stretching up to the ceiling. There are signs that say “Please Let Us Wash and Fold Your Cellphones” and “Please Keep Off the Grass Stains.”