By Keith Kreitman, Contributor
‘Einstein and the Polar Bear’ by Tom Griffin is as quirky a play as its title. As the Hillbarn Theatre in Foster City plays it, the acting is so good that the plot becomes secondary to its enjoyment. And enjoyable it is.
The title is misleading and represents only the secondary plots in the play. The Einstein refers to the mental meanderings of an aging father who claims to have met Einstein at a dinner many years before. And the polar bear is wandering the frozen fields of New England after being released from a zoo by vandals.
This is a character driven play; the interplay between them turns it into an oddly romantic comedy comedy.
The plot itself is thin and seems intended to be only a framework upon which to hang some wonderfully literate dialogue.
A famous writer, Bill Alenson (Adam Slusser), secludes himself after the death of his wife by operating a small bookstore in a tiny New England town where he lives with his aging, senile father, Andrew (Ray Doherty).
His turf is unexpectedly invaded by Diane Ashe (Margery Bailey), a New York City commercial artist stranded when her car breaks down in a snowstorm. She seeks shelter, and ends up staying the night.
The onstage chemistry between Slusser and Bailey may be because they’re a married couple in real life.
The other characters are endearing. Charlie Milton (William Davidovich) is the irrepressibly blunt, know-it-all village mailman, eager to spread the local gossip.
Helen and Bobby Bullins (Laura Jane Bailey and Spencer R. Stevenson) are a colorful village couple who are having some personal relationship problems of their own. He’s the town mechanic needed to repair Diane’s car.
Veteran actor Doherty puts on another one of his impressive character performances as the mentally degenerating father, who doesn’t really have much to say, but whose silences are eloquent.
Bill and Diane dance a literate, verbal gavotte around their growing personal attraction, but a surprise revelation near the end of play pulls that all together.
The difficulty in reviewing a play of this sort is that the joy is in the hearing. All six of these actors are first-rate performers who pull the words off the script and bring them to life in such a way that, in this intimate theatre, one feels that he is sitting in on the reality. This feeling is enhanced by the set, a charming casual mess of a small town New England combined book store and living room.
Hunt Burdick directs this wonderfully paced production.
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