Darkly fascinating tale

Theater

Lisa Gauthier

'The Pillowman' stars Doug Johnson, Michael Shelton and Alan Shepard.

The Pillowman
Phoenix Theatre
Directed by Bryan Fonseca
Through June 11

The Pillowman is about a writer, Katurian Katurian (his parents were funny people), who writes fairy tales from hell. Most of them have to do with children being tortured and/or killed, and most of them have an ingenious, if sadistic, twist to them.

If you’re all fluffy bunnies about little kiddies, you might find The Pillowman too disturbing for your tastes. If, however, little men made of apples forcing their ways down a little girl’s mouth in retribution for the slaying of their brothers is compelling — or you are a fan of a well-written short story, regardless of the subject matter: The Pillowman is a darkly fascinating tale.

The conflict of the play is that someone has been acting out Katurian’s stories. So Katurian (Michael Shelton) and his mentally challenged brother, Michal (Matthew Roland), have been taken into custody by a good cop, Tupolski (Alan Shepard), and a bad cop, Ariel (Douglas Johnson), to be tortured into some kind of confession.

Along the way, we are treated to some of Katurian’s short stories, some of which are acted out in dream sequences by Karen Irwin, Adam O. Crowe and Shelton’s daughter, Katherine. And we see what can happen to people in a totalitarian state. It’s not pretty.

The tightrope tension between interrogation and darkly funny storytelling is intense. The cast does top work maintaining the overall horror-like atmosphere in the face of stories that could be taken from the Devil’s nighttime reading. And the twists make the streets of San Francisco look easily passable.

The Pillowman isn’t for everyone, but for those who are up for an in-your-face approach to playwriting, it is surprisingly compelling.

The Pillowman, directed by Bryan Fonseca, continues at the Phoenix Theatre through June 11.