When you talk about a dog that has issues, you might call him or her, let’s say, anxious.  Fearful, sure. Even aggressive. But evil?

That, in fact, is what Mark St. Germain, brilliant stage and screenwriter and a Berkshire favorite, called the rescue dog his wife brought home six years ago: Evil. Her name was Evie, but switch the e to an l and you have a description of the dog St. Germain is convinced was a demon, as he writes in his new book, Walking Evil: How man’s best friend became man’s worst enemy.

It’s a truly funny book, and perfect material for the event Great Barrington Public Theater is hosting on November 28 at 2 p.m. at Saint James Place. St. Germain and actor friends will be reading excerpts, jazzed up a bit for this occasion as “semi plays” as declaimed by Donna Bullock, Peggy Pharr Wilson and David Smilow.

The compact memoir is filled with a pack of animals: Evie, St. Germain’s beloved dog Sarge (“the best dog ever born into this world,” and sadly no longer in it), and Charlie, the African Grey parrot. Both of them were terrorized by the new canine in the house. The only being who didn’t seem to have a problem with Evil’s chewing through hotel doors, eating car seats, running away, and routinely releasing her bowels in St. Germain’s writing studio, was his now ex-wife, whose response to all of Evil’s hellish behavior was “but she’s still a puppy!”

It’s hard to imagine St. Germain, the stage and screenwriter —whose plays "Freud’s Last Session" and "Becoming Dr .Ruth," both of which premiered at Barrington Stage Company and landed on Off-Broadway — in battle with a young lab/greyhound mix as he’s developing the riveting characters that show up in his work. He’s scripted plays about Sigmund Freud, Dr. Ruth Westheimer, Eleanor Roosevelt, Thomas Edison, and Typhoid Mary, to name a few, but when Evil showed up, the playwright became a character in his own story. Evil was a shapeshifter (she escaped a crate he deemed Fort Knox secure), an Academy Award-winning actor with strangers, and a breaker of dog trainers. Mostly, though, she hated him over everybody else.

Life can be cruel. The man who directed and co-produced the documentary "MY DOG: An Unconditional Love Story,” featuring Richard Gere, Glenn Close and Billy Collins, and who rewrote a script of Richard Gere’s that was later released as "HACHI," inspired by the true story of a dog going daily to the train station to meet his master for years after his master died, shouldn’t have been subjected to such a devil dog. Evil’s behavior was so targeted towards him that St. Germain consulted a dog therapist (she psychoanalyzed St. Germain), an animal communicator, and, yes, a Catholic priest. St. Germain begged him to do an exorcism on Evil (the priest refused). At the end of his rope, St. Germain tells his wife, “the dog’s clever, no, diabolical. She’s fooled everybody but me all along! She fooled you the same as she did that priest.”

You may be able to guess the ending, and even if you do, it’s a hilarious ride getting there. Yet, there’s more to the story. I found that out in speaking with the author — a twist so unbelievable that only a writer could come up with it. But he didn’t. It just happened, and I certainly am not going to be the spoiler here; you’ll have to attend the reading on Nov. 28 if you really want to know. The event will include an audience talkback, and St. Germain might divulge the rest of the story to you, too. You’re already sitting there, so you may as well stay for it. You won’t be disappointed.

Great Barrington Public Theater hosts Mark St. Germain with special guests reading from his new book, Walking Evil: How man’s best friend became man’s worst enemy
Sunday, Nov. 28, 2 p.m.
St. James Place, Great Barrington, MA
Tickets, $15, available here.

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