Family arguments going back decades make you wonder if "The Sisters Rosensweig" will ever get along, but playwright Wendy Wasserstein has so much love for these three sisters that you just know they'll resolve their differences. The Fells Point Corner Theatre production is suffused with the honest sentiment that is earned after hours of arguing.

The late playwright risks being overly schematic with the family situation here, because characters initially seem to fit too readily within neatly defined demographic categories. Wasserstein holds the stereotypes at bay, however, because the family members are shown to have all the quirks, contradictions and uncertainties of endearingly flawed real people.

Sara Goode (Lynda McClary) is celebrating her 54th birthday. She's come a long way from her New York roots. She's now a banker in London, has been divorced twice, and is raising a teen daughter, Tess (Jessica Behar), whose social activism places her at odds with the more conservative Sara. She also has acquired a slight British accent after only five years of living in London; correspondingly, she has moved even further away from her Jewish upbringing in Brooklyn.

The entire play takes place in Sara's tastefully furnished sitting room in London. Visiting her are her two younger sisters: Pfeni Rosensweig (Lisa Hodsoll), an unmarried travel writer whose bohemian ways are in stark contrast to Sara's settled existence; and Gorgeous Teitlebaum (Amy Jo Shapiro), a wife and mother who has remained close to her New York Jewish origins.

Strictly speaking, there isn't much of a plot in this 1992 play. Wasserstein's script readily acknowledges the influence of Chekhov's "Three Sisters" on a character study in which the vigorous dialogue supplies all the emotional movement one needs.

The sisters obsessively analyze their lives from childhood to the present, trying to figure out where they've taken wrong turns. As Gorgeous says at one point: "How did our nice Jewish mother do such a lousy job on us?"

There's also a lively roster of supporting characters. Geoffrey Duncan (Michael Styer) has been Pfeni's sort-of boyfriend for a long time; Mervyn Kant (Tony Colavito) is an American businessman whose amorous pursuit of the proudly unattached Sara would entail her accepting his strong ties to the Jewish cultural background from which both sprang; Tom Valiunus (Cole Matson) is Tess's boyfriend; and Nicholas Pym (Richard Dean Stover) is the stuffy Brit businessman who seems like a safer bet as a romantic partner for Sara.

A genuine sense of family comes across in this production. The actors playing the three sisters trade lines with natural ease, and they're quite good at striking the right emotional balance between humor and despair. Although the supporting players occasionally seem too self-conscious in their roles and go for broad gestures, they fortunately stop short of caricature.

Director Steve Goldklang's staging ensures that the family arguments flow rather than becoming static. These lively debates move along briskly, and they're also moving in a humanitarian regard. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll have a good time.

"The Sisters Rosensweig" runs through Dec. 7 at Fells Point Corner Theatre, at 251 S. Ann St., in Fells Point. Performances are Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. Tickets are $17, $15 for matinees. Call 410-276-7837 or go to www.fpct.org.

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