Splinter Group Stages a Single Mood in Three Parts

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Photo Credit: Ross Zentner

Playwright Tony DiMurro’s dramatic triptych 3 for the Road makes its world premiere with Splinter Group. Three shorts run through three dialogues between three pairs of people. There is no intermission, but there’s plenty of room to breathe. DiMurro’s dialogues are very wistful.

The first has a father digging a ditch thinking about his son. It’s mostly monologue. For the most part James Farrell does a good job of breathing life into the man with the shovel. His son’s there too. He’s played with charming love and frustration by Joe Picchetti. It’s a nice mood, but it feels kind of emotionally hollow.

The last part feels even more lost than the first part as Robert Hirschi plays a man trying to explain to his wife why he left her and his son without warning a long time ago. Both sit facing the audience. Both sit with infinite distance between them. It’s a piece reaching for some kind of dream. Diane Lane plays rightfully embittered patience as the wife in question. It ends the evening on a concave longing that feels appropriate.

There is a reason to see 3 for the Road and it comes between the first and the last shorts. The second short has Robert W.C. Kennedy as a man returning to his family after a long, unannounced absence. He’s itching to talk to someone about it, but Philip Sletteland is playing a man who has no interest in talking to anybody for his own reasons. The two have a really intricate and interesting exchange that’s captivating and provocative enough to justify the relatively nebulous drama that begins and ends the show.

Splinter Group’s 3 for the Road runs through Feb. 22 at the Marian Center for Nonprofits, 3211 S. Lake Drive. For tickets, visit splintergroup.brownpapertickets.com.