The first few minutes of "A Delicate Balance," Edward Albee's Pulitzer Prize-winning play, suggest you're in for two hours of dry, high-brow drama, but don't let the classical music and WASP-y set decor fool you. This play, currently in the Stiemke Theater, is edgy, emotional and features flawless performances by six Milwaukee Repertory Theater members.

The script explores the disappointments of life at middle age, and reminds us that even for the wealthy, such let-downs are unavoidable.

Agnes (Elizabeth Norment) and Tobias (James Pickering) share a stately home, a club membership, a penchant for cocktails and a thrice-divorced daughter, Julia, yet they no longer sleep in the same bed and show just as little affection for friends and family members.

However, despite their cold, emotionless demeanor, Agnes and Tobias attract long-term guests like polar bears to snow drifts. Clare (Lori Birmingham), Agnes' free-spirited sister, has freeloaded for years, and after her fourth marriage falls apart, Julia (Deborah Staples) returns home to heal, only to find her bedroom inhabited by Harry and Edna, friends from The Club who suffered mysterious, emotional meltdowns.

The show, which runs about two-and-a-half hours long including two intermissions, quickly becomes a question of boundaries: Are any of the dysfunctional guests overstepping boundaries? Are all of them? Not one asked permission to stay with Agnes and Tobias, but should they have to?

At first, Clare seems like the obvious boundary over-stepper. She pours vodka into her morning orange juice, plays the accordion while three sheets to the wind and constantly kicks up enough emotional debris to fluster her buttoned-down sister. However, despite her sharp tongue, inability to hold down a job and animated antics, it seems Clare is the only one who has a grip on reality, and the only one capable of truth-telling and real love.

Agnes speaks about overstepping boundaries, too, but prides herself for staying in shape, both physically and emotionally, and for being the one who keeps the family together. Yet in the beginning and at the end of the show, Agnes ponders the possibility of allowing herself to go mad, and even though she is not labeled an alcoholic, Agnes -- as well as Tobias and Harry -- drinks more than a "normal" number of nightcaps.

All six characters deserve a standing ovation. Pickering is fantastic as the emotionally-tormented-yet-emotionally-unavailable conservative, and John Kishline and Rose Pickering are so real as Harry and Edna, it's spooky. But most memorable is Birmingham, who brings the perfect balance of poignancy and wit to a play that, although 35 years old, is still extremely timely and meaningful.

"A Delicate Balance" plays through Sun., Oct. 6. Call (414) 224-9490 for tickets.