←Recommendations of Joan's Arc

Oh wow. This play about a teenage girl struggling after her best friend dies in a school shooting is so, so good. There's plenty of sadness, but there's also humor as well. I love the way the group text is represented on stage, and Emily Hageman absolutely nails teenage voices. This is a wonderful study on grief and grappling with the discovery that sometimes in this world wrong wins.

A deeply-felt work about the epidemic of school violence, “Joan’s Arc” manages to be beautifully personal and introspective, while also frank and uncompromising in its message. Hageman is incredibly skilled at crafting high school-aged characters that feel real and I was particularly impressed with how essential each one was to the themes and the story and the play’s central questions. A necessarily raw but hopeful piece on grief, memory, and the loss of innocence; one of the best I’ve read about the topic.

Wow. Had to take a break at the end of act 1 so I could calm myself down. And of course, at the end of act 2, tears are flowing again. This is such a great play because it doesn't focus on the actual school shooting...the "why did this happen?" This is about living, living as a whole, imperfect human being. Doing your best to be better. This is so beautiful and I hope it gets produced a million times because more people need to see/hear these words.

A great, insightful, tightly structured play, dealing with an important issue. Issue plays can be didactic, here I was brought in by the characters and the surprising plot twists. The play paints a realistic portrait of the complexities of grief in the aftermath of an unseen school shooting. .

An insightful exploration of young people (and a couple of adults) coping with and healing from trauma. In focusing not necessarily on the tragic event itself, but one student's quest for truth about a wholly different matter afterward, Hageman says much more about how we heal and move on in a poignant fashion than I believe would be the case if the play simply clung to the gory details. Wonderfully theatrical--I can see the powerful images leap off the page in my "director-mind." Additionally, young actors are -served by these complex, funny, human, and naturally rendered characters.

Hageman's signature theatricality and talent for writing young voices shine through in this chilling play. The chorus of voices cuts to the soul, and imagining Joan's pain is heartbreaking, making the twists and turns of normal high school life seem insignificant. Through it all, the moments of high school normalcy and humor really hit the spot. It's quite the experience - check it out and put it up!

Hageman does a masterful job creating teenage speak, telling an open-hearted story of finding your people in the face of devastating loss. “Joan’s Arc” is a touching, gripping high school drama, a teen caper set against the background of a school shooting, one which should produced in schools all across our troubled nation.

Moving and suspenseful. Hageman writes so beautifully and realistically about young people, and Joan is a terrific character. What I love about this play is that it doesn't just focus on Joan's grief and the harrowing experience of a school shooting. Instead, we follow Joan as she tries to move forward and solve a puzzling and disturbing mystery at her school. Another wonderful new work from Hageman.

Everything that sets Emily Hageman’s work apart in short and one act formats really shines in JOAN’S ARC. Once again, Hageman has chosen several incredibly difficult topics – school shootings, mental illness, grief, the bureaucracy of America’s public education system, etc – and placed them into a play that is so readily accessible to a younger audience. It’s truly an inspiration and I hope to see more full-length works from her in the future. #PlaywrightPlug

*joyful noise over another Hageman full-length*
*falls over*
Hageman puts all her signature moves - adorable teenagers, a mix of heart, HUMOR and heartache - to very fine use here, a response to gun violence in school mixed with a Chinatown-esque mystery and then the way we, all of us, are just stumbling around trying to make sense of things.
Produce her work produce her work produce her work, my god, produce her work
If you've never read her writing before, you are in for a treat. If you have, this is the same excellence you are right to expect.