ENTERTAINMENT

‘Girl’s Room’ opens at Women’s Theater Co.

BILL NUTT
CORRESPONDENT

Two mothers and two daughters are together in a room. But there are only three people in that room. How is this possible?

Answer: The three women are three generations of the same family: a grandmother, a mother, and a daughter.

That riddle actually serves as the set-up for “Girl’s Room,” the play that will run at the Women’s Theater Co. in Parsippany tonight through March 20.

Over the course of the play, the trio of women share some laughs, unearth some secrets about each other, and reveal some long-buried frustrations about their respective places in the family.

Playwright Joni Fritz admits that the scenario of “Girl’s Room” is drawn from her own life.

“Several years ago, I was visiting my mom’s house, and my grandmother was there, too,” says Fritz. “We were all in my childhood bedroom, which I hadn’t been in for years.”

“It was like a bizarre dysfunctional slumber party,” Fritz continues. “We talked through the night. Buttons were pushed.”

The fact that “Girl’s Room” is being presented at Women’s Theater Co. is significant, according to Fritz. The first public reading of the play took place at the theater in 2007. It has since been produced in New York, Los Angeles, and elsewhere.

“It’s coming full circle,” Fritz says. At the same time, though, what audiences will see on the stage is quite different from what was originally read nine years ago.

“The play has changed a lot in that time,” she says. “It was written in another time in my life.” For the current production, Fritz felt the need to trim some passages that she felt were “overwritten.”

Fritz admits that she often draws from personal experience for her plays. Her 2015 comedy, “In the Car with Blossom and Len” (which had its world premiere at Centenary Stage Co.) was inspired by her elderly parents.

“I write what I know, but I also have to write when I’m ready to write it,” she says. “I couldn’t have written ‘Girl’s Room’ today.”

Fritz adds that audiences should not assume her characters are purely autobiographical. For example, the daughter in “Girl’s Room” is a composite of herself and her sister, besides having completely fictional aspects.

“I write character-driven plays,” she says. “I love sticking characters in a crisis to see what they do.”

Fritz is also able to draw on her own experiences as a stage and screen actress. “Thanks to that, I have a good idea of what dialogue works, of the arc of a character, and the character beats in a story,” she says.

Patricia Durante, who is directing the production of “Girl’s Room,” feels that Fritz has succeeded in creating distinctive but relatable characters.

“I think audiences will identify with these characters,” Durante says. “They’re real people. You are these characters, or you know people who are these characters.”

Both Durante and Fritz stress that “Girl’s Room” is primarily a comedy. “There’s so much humor,” Durante says. “People are going to say, ‘Oh, my sister drives me crazy, too,’ or ‘My mother is just like that.’ ”

“It’s been fun revisiting this play,” Fritz says. “I’m proudest of the relationships. You end up liking these characters and seeing the love they have for each other.”

Fritz also emphasizes that, while she writes mainly from the female perspective, her plays are not exclusively for women. “This is a play for women, but it’s also a play for the men who love women,” she says.

GIRL’S ROOM

WHEN: Through March 20,

8 p.m. Fridays; 3 and 8 p.m. Saturdays;

3 p.m. Sundays.

WHERE: Women’s Theater Co.,

Parsippany Playhouse at Parsippany Community Center, 1130 Knoll Rd.,

Lake Hiawatha. (On a GPS system, use

“Boonton, NJ 07005.”)

TICKETS: $25, $20 for seniors

INFO: 973-316-3033 or www.womenstheater.org.