Ashland Avenue has been heavily promoted as a vehicle for Jenna Fischer of The Office fame, but Francis Guinan, as her father (not a bartender on the Enterprise), is the focus and star of the show.

I’ve never seen a complete episode of The Office. Jenna could have been Bobby Fischer and I wouldn’t have known the difference, so I had no particular expectations and she was fine, if not memorable.

I have, however, had a special fondness for alliterative play titles ever since Neil Simon took us through all the B’s. Had this world premiere been called The Life and Times of a TV Salesman, I probably wouldn’t have gone.

Guinan’s character is someone you can feel for and, at the same time, want to strangle, especially since the playwright, who, by the way, is Fischer’s husband Lee Kirk (they didn’t promote that fact), decided to go for an abundance of repetition. I’m not into storming stages, so I settled instead for shaming the woman next to me into turning off her phone screen.

The first act was so-so, but the second was somewhat worth the wait, if only the wait had been shorter, with a lot of laughs; a few twists and turns; and a satisfying, unforced resolution to the play, which didn’t seem like a sure thing, until it was.