The Diviners Play Analysis

Jim Leonard Jr.’s The Diviners is a compelling story shrouded in symbolism for the audience to decipher for themselves. This year, Saxon Drama is presenting the show March 10, 11, 17, and 18 at 7 p.m in the Rose Auditorium at South Salem High School. Tickets are $8 for students and senior citizens and $10 for adults. The show’s director, Robert Salberg, has a strong affinity for the script claiming that “No script has ever stuck with [him] like The Diviners.” The show is a very personal show that every member of the cast can relate and dive head first into, it seemed that every actor had their own theories about why they were there and their characters’ back stories. Max Morter’s performance as Buddy Layman was extremely impressive considering the dedication necessary to play a character with issues such as Buddy’s. If you saw Max backstage for some reason, you would see that he remained in character even in the moments when he was not on
The set was absolutely stunning. It involved two raked platforms which were screwed to the actual floor of the stage, three flat platforms on the back, and two bridges connecting the flat platforms to the raked ones. The gap between the floor and the top of the back platforms were covered with burlap which gave it a very distinguished rustic look. The platforms were all painted and textured to make it look distressed and dirty and the floor was painted up to the audience. The backdrop was painted to look like a sky with rolling fields off in the distance and big fluffy clouds. Everything looked exceptionally realistic and it was gorgeous. The audience could tell that tons of work went into creating this alternate reality. The colors used were fairly basic, mainly blues and browns, but they represented the symbolism well. Due to the amount of times water and dirt are mentioned in the show, the sets color palette reflected the script