Tonto Fielding’s first play, “Oy Vay, My Son Moved to Athens,” showed great promise, but closed on the first night anyway. I thought that my premise was sound. A young man from Cleveland goes to Ohio University, and remains after graduation, because he makes a wager between God and Satan about the material world's false promises. The allegory that I meant to portray showed that you need to beware when money sounds sweeter than music. In the play I caution that those who win lotteries stand to lose all, including their spiritual treasures, families, communities and religion. My student, Hershel Dubrovner, was living a good life until he meets a young white man with dread locks who shares a mutual affinity for the band Phish, and turns Hershel into a greedy, dishonest taco vender whose success desecrates both his religion and his community. Betrayal and abandonment replace serenity and familiarity; the instruments of good fortune become instruments of death. Not even the band Phish, previously Hershel’s joy, can heal these rifts.
