The prolific Horovitz, now entering his fifth decade as a significant American playwright, sets a bountiful table for actors. There’s a reason his early plays helped launch the likes of Al Pacino, John Cazale, Jill Clayburgh, Richard Dreyfuss, and Scott Glenn. Horovitz reliably offers his actors a feast of elliptical, vaguely menacing dialogue, plots that are booby-trapped with surprises and twisty turnabouts, action that is both physical and psychological, and sometimes, as in “Sins of the Mother,’’ a chance to try out their Boston accents.
Under the direction of the playwright, a vibrant cast makes the most of it in a new production of “Sins’’ at Gloucester Stage Company. (A one-act play when it premiered at Gloucester Stage six years ago, it was expanded by Horovitz into a full-length work).
The emotional center of “Sins’’ is occupied by Bobby Maloney (Robert Walsh), a Vietnam veteran in his mid-50s with a terminally ill wife and bleak job prospects. He’s not alone: The fishing industry has declined, bringing lean times to Gloucester. That leaves Bobby plenty of time to chew the fat with the three other unemployed guys who join him early one morning in the stevedores’ union meeting room of a largely closed fish-processing plant.
There is Frankie Verga, a loose cannon embittered by the success of his identical twin brother, Philly (Christopher Whalen plays both roles); Dubbah Morrison (David Nail), a well-meaning doofus relegated to boasting of his vegetarianism (“I’m 13 1/2-years meat-sober’’ is how he puts it); and Douggie Shimmatarro (Francisco Solorzano), whose life story delivers a jolt to the others, especially when they learn who his mother was.
There will be no spoilers here, but suffice it to say that the foursome’s conversation steadily moves into dangerous territory, exposing long-buried secrets and hidden connections that build to a confrontation. In detailing those connections, “Sins’’ is at times overly schematic and reliant on coincidences. A second-act soliloquy by Dubbah seems tacked on, as if the playwright concluded it was simply the character’s turn to bare his soul.
