Joe DiPietro

During the 2002 - 2003 theater season at Venice Theater, Robert "Bob"
DeCecco played the lead role in a production of Joe DiPietro’s Over the
River and Through the Woods at Venice Little Theatre. Bob was excited to
be able to share his love of theater with the community and support the
local arts.

Joe DiPietro is a New Jersey-born playwright who is best known for
the off-Broadway hit I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, which he
wrote in collaboration with Jimmy Roberts. In 2000, Joe DiPietro
received an Edgar Award for Best Mystery Play in recognition of his work
The Art of Murder. He has also accepted a William Inge Theater Festival
New Voices in American Theater Award and an O’Neill National
Playwright’s Conference MacArthur Award for comic writing. Authored in
1994, Over the River and Through the Woods is one of Joe DiPietro’s
earliest plays. The work is a comedy about Italian-American familial
love, framed as a trip to the grandparents’ house in New Jersey, during
which the protagonist announces a promotion at work and the subsequent
need to move to Seattle. Joe DiPietro writes semi-autobiographically,
basing his characters on his own grandparents, but completely
fabricating the plot. Over the River and Through the Woods is a
heartfelt journey through familial relations and an entertaining look at
generational differences that is bound to please audiences of all ages.