Stephanie Griffin

Redone
In the satirical play "Edifice WRECKS”, the nation of Chutzpatopia is a seemingly blissful place with a sunny disposition. This all changes when a self-proclaimed savior named Edifice descends on a golden escalator, promising to "fix everything." Edifice, a vain, germaphobic, and tyrannical leader, rules with the help of his sycophants: the groveling, power-hungry Snakely and the fawning, propaganda-spreading Dinah.
The play opens with Snakely bringing a "uranium" cake to Edifice, which he tricks the leader into eating by telling him it's a "superfood." Snakely secretly advises Edifice from behind a glassless mirror, wearing a Darth Vader mask and speaking in a booming "God Voice. Dinah also reinforces Edifice’s delusions by presenting him with fabricated polls and "breaking news" that confirm his popularity and genius.
As the play progresses, the floods Edifice promised to fix arrive with a vengeance. Despite the obvious signs of climate-related disaster—rising water, a tornado, and a collapsing building—Edifice and his followers remain in denial. He dismisses the reality of the situation, blaming "Communist scientists" and "AI bots" for the chaos. Edifice's self-obsession and paranoia increase, leading him to believe he is a god and to reject the help of science. When the building begins to float away, Edifice refuses to leave his golden chambers.
In a final act of betrayal, Snakely reveals his true motivations, calling Edifice a "vain, pompous ass" and blaming him for the catastrophe. The two men struggle, and Snakely drowns Edifice. The play concludes with the Commentator returning to inform the audience that Edifice has drowned, his followers have sunk like stones, and the scientists have survived. The Commentator's final, cryptic advice to the audience is, "Don't eat the cake."

A Family Business is a one-act 90-minute play, with a cast of 5 (2 men, 3 women), first developed with the Hoboken Writers Group, set in the viewing room of a family-owned funeral parlor in 1979 in a blue-collar part of urban New Jersey.

A Family Business is a poignant and bittersweet comedy about life, death, and community. As the central character, Theresa, puts the finishing touches on the body of her father–in–law, Big Anthony, for his wake, she is also preparing herself to tell her husband that she is ready to try again to get pregnant after the death of their first child. Death and the desire for new life, comically collide as one generation begins to give way to the next. Questions about tradition, family duties and dreams, and what we owe the past come to the surface through the public rituals of mourning and farewell, all under the watchful and sardonic eyes of two elderly busybody neighbors who are also practiced mourners. By the play’s end, Big Anthony is not all that gets laid to rest.

This play was developed in collaboration with the DGPG and Winter Miller. It has been presented in staged readings at the Media Art Center and the Theater Project in New Jersey.

Define good is a 90-minute one-act play with a cast of 9 characters
(4 male roles, 2 double cast; 5 women’s roles, 4 roles double cast. It was developed in collaboration with the DGPG and Winter Miller.

Define Good is loosely inspired by the true story of a 1970s college activist, gone into 20 years of hiding from law enforcement after committing a crime in the service of her cause, who eventually turned herself into the FBI. In the play, through challenging conversations with St. Joan of Arc, Barbara, a bright and devout Catholic girl, answers her conscience’s call, painfully awakening to the world’s injustice, violating traditional boundaries in the process, and unintentionally participating in a murder. By the play’s end, Barbara seeks to understand and heal the wreckage she has left behind, not only in her own life, but in the lives of her family, and her victim’s family. Define Good examines the ambiguities and limits that come with truly serving a cause, or a set of beliefs about what is right, and how far a person will go to act upon them, potentially risking harm either to themselves or others.

It has been presented in staged readings in Philadelphia, and the Theater Project in New Jersey.

No one is Innocent is a two-act play that follows three generations of women, beginning in Nazi-occupied France through the late twentieth century, as they live with the cost of the complex choices they made in order to survive. The play has a cast of 6 characters (2 men and 2 women doubling roles).

Opening in 1944 in a small war-torn French village, No One is Innocent dramatizes the intersecting and agonizing choices of allegiance, whether to one’s country, one’s family, one’s beliefs, or one’s first love, and the generations-long burden of secrets those choices unleash. As the war’s survivors seek to rebuild their lives and raise their families in the wake of physical and psychological destruction, the revelation of these secrets, and the ensuing charges of guilt, will test familial and romantic bonds to their breaking point.

It has been presented in staged readings in Hoboken, New Jersey, the Theater Project in New Jersey, and by the Philadelphia Dramatist Guild.

A New Comedy of Spiritual Neglect
Audrey is a high-strung New Jersey housewife who, in a fit of real-estate-induced mania, buries a statue of Saint Joseph upside down to trigger a house sale. To her mounting horror, the ritual actually works: a very real, very confused Yosef crawls out of the mulch, smelling of cedar and first-century dust.
As Audrey attempts to hide the Holy Carpenter in her garage, her lackluster husband, Larry, accidentally trips into the lawn-portal and tumbles back to ancient Nazareth. There, he encounters a teenage Yeshua who is significantly more snarky than the stained-glass windows suggested.
What follows is a frantic, absurdist cultural exchange across a rift in the crabgrass. While the two families grapple with the terrifying reality of actual miracles, they are forced to confront the fact that faith is messy, marriage is hard, and God probably doesn't care about their curb appeal.

Joyce is unsatisfied with her existence as a suburban housewife; it is like an itch she can't scratch - until she sees a broken-down houseboat at a tag sale. The boat speaks to her. She brings it home, places it on her lawn in her manicured suburban neighborhood, and changes her life.

The Genius Stable is a satire, loosely based on the characters in our present-day government. An election is looming in the kingdom of Chutzpatopia. A plague (climate change) is wreaking havoc in the land. A prophet (Bill Nye) predicts that as long as a horse’s ass (President Rump) leads the government, the plagues will continue. To what lengths of distraction and lies will the President and his sycophant advisors go to stay in power?

Gusty, a crab fisherman, needs his porch to host a “meet and greet” with the Island voters. His son, Darwin is building an Ark while his wife, Gaia, is helping Darwin by painting a flag. Gusty is desperate to be mayor, Darwin is desperate to be a musical star, and Gaia wants to sit on the porch and enjoy her new waterfront property. How do they resolve the dilemma?
As the weather becomes more severe and intense, so does the tension between the family.

A young man and his mother live quietly in their humble home. Their life is perfectly calm until the circus comes to town. The circus causes family secrets into the open. These secrets threaten to change their lives forever.

Life changes dramatically for Lucy, when her husband of 50 years complains about her stew.

Two strangers meet in a train station. Their lives become entangled when an ICE agent shows up to search for illegal immigrants.

Leap of Faith is the story of two sisters, Jessica and Cookie, who find themselves locked in a custody battle for Cookie’s seven-year-old daughter. The play explores questions of nature vs. nurture; women trying to balance family duties with career opportunities, and ultimately, what it mean to be a mother.

A retiring cop rings a doorbell. I’ve come for your husband. Easier said than done.
A routine arrest becomes anything but routine when the cop is faced with the question, what is more important – truth or happiness?

Twin brothers are on their way to celebrate their 40th birthday. Their ritual ride on the subway to their parents’ home turns dark when the train stalls between stations and the birthday cake begins to melt.