Dave Heath, Savannah Irish, Jesse Leighton and J. Will Fritz in “Witch” at Mad Horse Theatre. Photo by Jennifer Battis Photography

Differing reactions are likely to arise in folks after seeing the season-opening production at Mad Horse Theatre in South Portland. Playwright Jen Silverman’s “Witch” will entertain but may also haunt the minds of theatergoers.

Though its wackiness befuddled some, Silverman’s “The Moors” was a popular local hit a couple of years ago for the Dramatic Repertory Company in Portland. “Witch” reconfirms the writer’s fertile mind and digs a little deeper and darker into some provocative questions about human motives and desires. The ideas presented are spookier than those contained in any fanciful narrative.

As in “The Moors,” Silverman dips into classical literature in creating this play, which they have referred to as a “riff” on a Jacobean work from 1621. Set in a small town with costuming (by Christine Marshall) appropriate to the 17th-century period, this Hollie Pryor-directed production avoids stylized accents. The humor tends toward the cerebral.

The title character is named Elizabeth. Not really a witch, she’s just labeled as one by local townsfolk for being a bit eccentric and tainted in their conformist eyes. When she’s visited by Scratch, a low-ranking demon seeking to improve his lot by purchasing the souls of humans, she’s intrigued but refuses his offer, if not entirely his advances.

Scratch has already grabbed the souls of two men who are in competition to inherit the estate of wealthy aristocrat Sir Arthur. He’s father to the “gentle” Cuddy but favors the obsequious, unrelated Frank. Among complications, Cuddy is secretly in love with Frank, who is covertly married to a servant of Sir Arthur. But he, the couple fears, would not approve of her being a wife to his heir. The hopelessly-in-love Winnifred, therefore, serves the men and suffers in silence amid all the macho posturing, at least initially.

The two younger men, all wrapped up in jealousy, have sold their souls for fame and fortune while the female characters resist. Issues of gender, sexuality, income inequality and toxic cultural norms arise during this introspective two-hour (without intermission) play.

Mad Horse veteran Janice Gardner gives her Elizabeth a powerful, cutting rationality that places the initially smirking Scratch on the defensive. Mason Hawkes, as the junior devil, discovers the soft underside of his character, as Gardner later does, in some touching scenes.

J. Will Fritz earns the most laughs with his squishy Cuddy evolving into a mad dancer (choreography by Nancy Salmon) as his hopes vanish. Jesse Leighton gives his Frank a hard-hearted determination to succeed, even at the expense of losing Winnifred, played by Mad Horse regular Savannah Irish with an affecting, childlike quality.

Dave Heath rounds out the cast as a secretly sensitive Sir Arthur in a play that emphasizes how society too often forces people to confront definitions imposed upon them or risk suffering the devilish consequences.

Steve Feeney is a freelance writer who lives in Portland.