The play was an old chestnut, but thanks to impeccable casting and insightful direction, Paragon Theatre Company breathed new life into Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? You couldn't help admiring Martha Harmon Pardee's vitality and sheer, pull-out-the-stops courage as Martha; she came across as funny, smart, wrenchingly vulnerable and, in her own way, honest. Sam Gregory's George at first seemed the weaker of the two antagonists — but it didn't take long for the audience to figure out that George was a deadly opponent. These two had been fighting forever; it's what they did instead of sex. Add Ed Cord as Nick, blankly pleasant at first but slowly revealing his soulless ambition, and Barbra Andrews's secretly spiteful Honey, and you had a mind-bending combination of slow simmer and all-out combustion.