Review: A family says goodbye

At People's Light and Theatre Company, Bill Cain's How to Write a New Book for the Bible actually presents an even more complicated set of instructions: How to honor thy parents while saying goodbye to them. Cain, a playwright, author, and Jesuit priest, cared for his mother in the last months of her life, keeping a diary he published as a memoir, and then in 2012 adapted into this four-person drama.

Narrated with direct address to the audience by Cain (Greg Wood), he introduces his older brother, Vietnam veteran Paul (Peter DeLaurier), his late father, Pete (Stephen Novelli), and mother, Mary (Alda Cortese), "an ordinary woman who died an ordinary death." As a priest, Cain takes great care to emphasize the relationships his family's names have to their biblical counterparts. But the piece barely strays into the biblical realm, settling into a mostly straightforward earthbound narrative of Mary's decline.

Roman Tatarowicz's set, a bare-bones wood platform occasionally punctuated by a brown wooden door, slides onstage whenever needed and doesn't add much in the way of visual interest, even if it underscores the ordinariness of this story. Judging by photos of other productions, it seems many of the design restrictions are scripted, anyway.

What does work is People's Light's production. Abigail Adams' direction and her winning cast pace Cain's material for maximum emotional impact. Wood proves a narrator both amiable and compelling, and what Cain's story lacks in surprises the actor provides by way of solid storytelling and performance. Cortese also gives Mary more presence and personality than Cain's script offers, making her a tough old broad and a stalwart matriarch who loves her boys but remains something of a mystery to them.

And perhaps this last bit is key to why Cain's story of his mother's death isn't the whole story of Mary's death. He includes a theme of "mystery" throughout, discussing his family's various mysteries: why his brother seemed so distant, why his father loved a woman who wasn't entirely able to be loved. But the mysteries drop clues and are solved, with a final burst of information that connects the dots and results in a complete picture of its subject.

Adams and her cast do a great job of plotting all those dots, but what's created is a general outline of family dynamics and coping with the decline of elderly parents - surely a worthwhile effort, but one that trades drama for a gentle touch. Not the worst flaw, but one that becomes more pronounced by the end of its two full acts.

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How to Write a New Book

for the Bible

Through June 28 at People's Light and Theatre Company,

39 Conestoga Rd., Malvern.

Tickets: $27-$77. Information: 610-644-3500 or PeoplesLight.org.EndText