“Originality has to hurt,” the raging old sage tells his young acolyte in The Stone Witch. “It has to cost. It comes with pain–the pain of suffering.”
The real pain will be suffering through The Stone Witch, a remarkably unoriginal drama that opened on Sunday at the Westside Theatre.
The threadbare scenario that is patchily embroidered by Shem Bitterman, the playwright, involves the trope regarding an insufferable genius and the admirer who tries to rescue him from creative malaise.
The celebrated artist in this three-character drama is one Simon Grindberg, a venerable writer-illustrator of fanciful children’s literature—think Maurice Sendak—who has not generated a book in a dozen years. Arriving at Grindberg’s lonely retreat deep in the woods is Peter, a would-be writer-illustrator of fanciful children’s literature, who has been dispatched by Grindberg’s editor, Clair, to serve as an uncredited collaborator.
Grindberg proves to be a grumpy eccentric who plays with toy soldiers and speaks to imaginary friends. Peter is a bright, callow fellow who genuinely wants to assist his idol. Their sessions seem unproductive. Grindberg does not believe Peter’s presence to be helpful even as he appropriates the title of the younger man’s work-in-progress, which is called The Stone Witch. Even as their relationship improves, Peter fears that the bemused Grindberg is becoming delusional. A born and bred American, Grindberg is shown to be somehow haunted by terrors relating to the Holocaust.
Will Grindberg ever create another book? Will Peter learn something from this experience? Will Clair show up again in the story? And can you manage to stay awake?
A tedious 90 minutes, the play is flat in dialogue and thin in its characterizations. In what appears to be a wise attempt to fill in the story’s blanks, a series of large, animated projections of colorful illustrations often materialize within the vast windows at the rear of the artist’s studio. Those picturesque premises are handsomely designed by Yael Pardess, who also is credited with the art design for the projections.
Dan Lauria, fondly remembered for playing the dad on The Wonder Years series on TV, portrays the curmudgeonly Grindberg with a shaggy goatee and a gruff sense of arrogance. Rupak Ginn gives Peter an earnest likeability. Carolyn McCormick, perhaps best recalled as Dr. Elizabeth Olivet, the ever-concerned psychologist of Law & Order, coolly and elegantly handles the thankless role of Clair.
Steve Zuckerman, the director, apparently has instructed the actors at various times to suspend their gestures for several beats in order to underline certain points of narrative importance. This does not lend any great dramatic impact to such a tiresome mingling of shallow writing and whimsical visuals.
The Stone Witch opened March 25, 2018, at the Westside Theatre. Tickets and information: stonewitchplay.com
