Springs Ensemble Theatre Company mounts a chilling noir thriller

The Springs Ensemble Theatre (SET) has a show for you if plot twists and noir thrillers are your jam. On Clover Road, a play by Steven Dietz, is a dark thriller filled with plenty of action and suspense.

Set in a seedy motel on the outskirts of nowhere, On Clover Road is the story of Kate (Sarah Embree), a mother who has hired a detective-deprogrammer, Stine (Steve Emily), to rescue her runaway daughter, Jessie, from the clutches of a cult.

The play features dramatic character reveals that spin the story 180 degrees from where it seemed to be heading. Stine, for example, in addition to being a disreputable thug for hire, may have an agenda beyond ripping off a vulnerable parent.

It is all very attention-grabbing, but Dietz’s script falters with its character development. Reveals lead to immediate action, threats, often a fight — and the action then shifts to an entirely new playing field. The play focuses on shock turnabouts – suddenly someone points the gun at someone else – over exploring character motivations.

For instance, in the opening scene, Stine is so deliberately piggish and degrading to Kate that one wonders how Kate came to hire him. The obvious answer is desperation, but the play eventually hints that Kate is as gullible as her runaway teen-age daughter. This is a tantalizing character insight that the play doesn’t really cultivate. In the end, the sought-after mother-daughter reunion is so sidelined by plot twists that it doesn’t pack much cathartic punch.

Volleys of dialogue

 SET’s production, as usual, is consummately professional. Director Stephen Alan Carver keeps the pace moving. The cast expertly threaten, interrupt and talk over each other in sustained volleys of dialogue.

Sarah Embree leads the cast as Kate, whose odd combination of the stalwart and the gullible is so poignant. Steve Emily, the show’s producer, makes Stine believably callous. Sheridan Singer, as a girl who may be Jessie, shifts easily from terrified to terrorizer. Sean Verdu’s snake-oil-salesman-cum-cult-prophet, Harris, displays an appropriately elastic range of facial expressions. In her brief appearance, McLain Murphy, as the second girl who may be Jessie, makes an immediate and vivid impression as she moves from eerily detached to taunting to tentative connection.

The sound design, by Kitty Robbins, is truly the MVP of this production. The sound functions more like a film soundtrack supplying a steady commentary on the action. Sounds of railroad trains, lullabies, barking dogs and chimes created much of the play’s atmosphere. At climactic moments, the sound suddenly goes silent, heightening the suspense.

Scenic Designer Dan Robbins has created a squalid room whose confines reflect the grim story taking place.

On Clover Road features a good deal of physical conflict. The fights were generally well-choreographed — but not all of them really worked. Kate’s early slap-in-the-face of Stine, for example, sounded and looked like a tap.

On Clover Road is a pulse-pounding story of characters driven to extremes. SET makes the most of its powerful events.