Interview: Francesca DiFrancisco of THE CALL at Shedd Stage

Some writers often find inspiration in the oddest places.

Columbus-based playwright Francesca DiFrancisco’s latest work, THE CALL, was sparked during a visit to Disney World’s “Country Bear Jamboree.”

THE CALL makes its Columbus debut Jan. 22-25 at the Shedd Stage at the Columbus Performing Arts Center (549 Franklin Avenue in downtown Columbus). The 90-minute work explores isolation, mental health issues, and self-image problems many men face, heavy topics that evolved from animatronic singing bears.

“My mom (Gina Mouery) always drops little creative ideas (for stories) but never a full story,” DiFrancisco said with a laugh. “In 2017, we were looking around the Country Bear stage and there were these three heads – a moose, a bison, and an elk hanging on one of the walls.

“Mom goes, ‘I wonder what the story behind those three are?’ I remember asking her, ‘You got anything else to go with the story?’ She goes, ‘Nope, just that.’”

That was enough.

With that idea planted in her head, DiFrancisco traveled through Europe with a couple of male friends and they began discussing issues many men face.

“I wanted to write a story about the different shades of mental health and layers of expectations and pressures on men,” she recalled. “I wanted to pair it with the culture of angsty isolation of the 90s with the images of nature. I thought this could be a really interesting aesthetic to set the scene for those themes.”

With the vision of Melvin the Moose, Buff the Buffalo, and Max the Stag and the embers of the conversations with her friends in her mind, she set to work on THE CALL.

DiFrancisco says THE CALL is a memory play in which agoraphobic Danny Bowen (A.J. Breslin) lives by himself in McCall, Idaho after the tragic death of his brother Greg (Jacob Erney). Suddenly, Deirdre Delphin (Anna Soppelsa), a mysterious visitor to McCall, challenges Danny’s convictions and beliefs.

Rounding out the cast are Santigui Camara (who is cast as Calvin Sotherbe) and Scott Willis (who plays Danny’s father Elison).

“The play explores what happens when an unexpected visitor opens up the doors of something you never thought you would open up again,” DiFrancisco said.

DiFrancisco credits late filmmaker David Lynch as an influence for her play.

 “THE CALL has a surreal, Lynchian vibe at the beginning of the show,” she said.

THE CALL is the second self-penned play DiFrancisco released since 2025. Last February, she released her one-woman show, MAE WEST: AFTER DARK at the Abbey Theater of Dublin.

DiFrancisco debuted both works when she was a student at Denison University.

The experience of writing the two projects, however, proved to be markedly different. MAE WEST: AFTER DARK was a solo tour de force for DiFrancisco, an actress with nearly 45 stage credits. In that show, she carried almost all of the dialogue herself.

For the initial run of THE CALL, she instead enlisted five friends to collaborate with her to bring the characters to life.

While the playwright constantly tweaked the Mae West biography, DiFrancisco said THE CALL emerged quickly and has remained largely intact. DiFrancisco wrote only a handful of drafts, making few changes over the years and trusting the instincts that shaped the play from its earliest stages.

“I felt it was pretty solid,” she said. “I’m trusting my own instincts on this one.

“Probably the biggest thing that has changed is the cast. With that first cast, we were all really close friends, but since I’m independently producing it this time, I wanted to get people on board who supported the script.”

From the feedback she received from the first few viewings at Denison, DiFrancisco knew THE CALL was on the right track.

“One of the most interesting reactions I got was a couple of guys asked me, ‘You wrote this?’” she said with a laugh. “They seemed surprised a woman had a lot of keen insights about being a man.

“Most of them liked it, but some of the guys were very triggered by it because it was about trauma and mental health and the influences they have on your life. (They related to having) a father figure who provided a profound catalyst on how Danny internalizes things and feels a need to prove himself in different ways.”

What began as a moment of kitschy Disney whimsy has become a deeply personal examination of the things men rarely say out loud — and the cost of leaving them unsaid.