"Fully Committed," Becky Mode's first play and runaway success, details a workday in the life of Sam, a struggling actor making ends meet by answering phones at the hippest restaurant in town. While the rich, famous and bejeweled are upstairs partaking of the trendiest and most inventive dishes, wines and desserts, Sam is downstairs in the basement, dealing with as many as six phone lines at a time as people vie for reservations at the restaurant (which is "fully committed" up to three months in advance). He deals with everyone from matriarch socialites to Kuwaiti soldiers to celebrity assistants; most of them are not nice, and all of them are desperate. On top of all this, there is a persnickety cook, an MIA supervisor and a chef who, since being catapulted into fame fresh out of cooking school all of eight months ago, hasn't quite gotten over himself yet.

What's unusual about this play is that it's performed by one actor. At Seacoast Repertory Theatre in Portsmouth, John Kuntz plays not only Sam, but all the people who call in, as well as all of his coworkers and bosses. Forty personalities in all. He swaps back and forth between characters-complete with body language, vocal inflection and accents-in less than a millisecond at times. It's no small feat for any actor to tackle, and Kuntz jumps in fearlessly with valor and sparkling enthusiasm.

However, Kuntz's interpretation of Sam raises questions in the opening scene. When he first enters the office, hears a ringing phone, and sees that his coworkers are nowhere to be found, this should create a sense of urgency for Sam to leap into his job. Yet Kuntz takes his sweet time getting to the phone, performing a number of bits that are amusing, but which totally dissipate the tension of the scene, stunting the launching of the play. And while some of the characters he creates are funny, and as realistic as he can make them in 40 seconds, some are such over-the-top caricatures as to be off-putting. Most prominently this could be noted in the characters of Mrs. Sebag, a lady desperate for a table; Curtis, the assistant at Sam's talent agency; and Jerry, his actor friend. When Jerry speaks condescendingly to Sam, he dances around while pointing his fingers like little guns; I don't know anyone who does that in real life. It completely broke the illusion for me.

Kuntz, while doing a fabulous job at pacing and keeping up his energy, never finds the comedic arc of the piece. We're supposed to like Sam because we can relate to him. Yet, instead of coming across as a likeable underdog, Kuntz's Sam is so sadly put-upon as to be almost pathetic; at times, I found it too painful to watch. In moments when I wanted to relate to Sam, I found my heart aching for him. The audience, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, remained silent.

There are highlights in the play that are fun and interesting and amusing, but it wasn't the all out belly-laugher of an evening I expected. Still, watching one man contort himself into 40 different people with skill and aplomb is never a wasted night.