Bildungsroman: Incredibly strong performances but the script is too much like a Fringe play

First of all, let us get the obvious out of the way: what the hell does "bildungsroman" mean and how do you pronounce it? With the help of Wikipedia, here is what you need to know:

The bildungsroman (German pronunciation: [?b?ld??s.?o?ma?n]; German: "formation novel") is a genre of the novel which focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood. Change is thus extremely important. The genre is further characterized by a number of formal, topical and thematic features. The term coming-of-age novel is sometimes used interchangeably with bildungsroman, but its use is usually wider and less technical.

Okay.  What the hell does this have to do with this play about two guys and their friendship? On stage we have a stand up comedian (the friend) and the other is an out of work writer who is attempting to write his first great novel - his bildungsroman. The writer shuts himself inside his apartment to get his masterpiece done while having to withstand the onslaught of his comedian friend who wants him to get out more and stop writing his novel. The friend is convinced that the writer is not going to get his masterpiece done if he doesn't remain connected to those around him. We watch various attempts to pull the writer from the apartment using beer and pizza as a first salvo. The rest of the action is pretty much that: loud friend vs. quiet introvert. We learn, as the play progresses, that the pizza has been spiked with magic mushrooms and we then journey into the hallucinations of the main character and how he learns a bit about himself and his relationship with his friend. Overall, the play feels like a great idea was hatched but the script wasn't up to completing the task. Something got lost along the way and the characters took over and derailed the script into moments of philosophical banter that lacked a common thread.

When the play was over, I did talk to a couple of female audience members and each said they didn't like the show because they didn't understand it. They thought it was inaccessible to women and felt that there wasn't enough connection between the title and the action on stage. I tend to agree. The story didn't match the confusing title. It seemed like a type of cruelty. The audience is sitting in the dark, waiting for the pay off but all that is truly going on is cool word usage and nothing to back it up.  

Now, I may have not loved the script and thought it needed a few more drafts to make it great - but I can't say enough good things about the performances. The actors on stage were "tight". They had obviously worked hard on this play and, I assume, they must have worked together before. They remained committed to their characters and gave very strong performances that made the whole show interesting. The banter between them was smooth and felt unrehearsed which is a good thing because the natural delivery made this script work. Who cares if the script was not "quite there" because the performances made it compelling to watch.

But, I come back to the initial problem - this play screams like the writer had a small piece of a great idea, wrote something he thought worked and then admits - at the very end - he hadn't quite achieved what he set out to do. 

I quote one of the final lines from the play: "It reads like a fucking Fringe play!" Yes, it does.