←Recommendations of Brian the Comet

Really beautiful work that achieves a striking balance between humor and poetry. Heartfelt without schmaltz, it considers what it takes to connect across the great distances life sometimes puts between us.

"I'm so scared all the time of moving forward because I'm constantly trying to predict what will happen..." The complexity and nuance of Emily Hageman's poetic dialogue alone makes Brian the Comet stand out among TYA plays. Add in beautiful, rich relationships and a poignant and important subject matter, and this play is one that must be read and seen on stage. Don't let its TYA label fool you. It's a play for our time, for everyone. Brava!

Beautiful, lyrical, and spare--this piece tackles mortality, dying, coping with terminal illness, and coming of age in a direct way. It treats its young characters (and young folks in the audience) like complex and intelligent human beings, and would appeal to younger and older audiences alike. Hageman's text is poetic yet accessible (and includes a couple of well-timed and welcome laugh moments), and she provides a beautiful blueprint that creative production teams can take in any number of varied directions. Wonderfully executed!

Poetic and beautifully crafted. Tender and hopeful and thoughtful and funny with wonderful parts for young actors.

Brian the Comet is a powerful coming-of-age story packed with poetry. This is so tender and beautiful, you can tell it was written with a lot of love. This play touched me deeply. Hageman is a master of her craft and is probably just generally awesome (I'm sure).

Structurally this play is perfect for a small drama department or a big drama class. It's filled to the brim with fascinating roles for actors to tackle. Produce this show.

Jude's mother the astronaut is on the least interesting journey of discovery in this incandescently lovely play. The narrative use of the ensemble adds wit and freshness to the story of Jude's struggle to learn to hope and then embrace the limits of hope. Her complex friendship with Brian the Comet as she also deals with her father's cancer is the moving and at times delightful center around which this wondrous story revolves.

Ordinarily, you see a one-act play with up to thirty characters, set in a hospital, and one character plays a vending machine, you expect to pass swiftly by. Emily Hageman, however, works with good humor, grace, and sensitivity in crafting a story that is both irreverent and touching, where the crowded ensemble work serves to exacerbate the way Jude is isolated in the world until she finds Brian. Lovely stuff.

Another gem by Hageman and one that has her wit, humor and heart all wrapped in such a beautiful ode to love and friendship and that oh so powerful force, hope. I am always moved by anything Hageman writes, but I am also inspired to be a better writer.

Is it better to go out into the world and want to know everything or to wait and let knowledge come at its own time? Do you ever wish to pause the earth so you can hold onto something precious longer? Hageman explores a lot of unknowns through the lens of a teen. Nothing is certain anymore in Jude’s life and she realizes that nothing will ever to certain again. But there are still surprises of amazing beauty. The sun comes up. There’s a new day and Hageman’s characters gives you that wonder.

I love this play. Not having read Emily Hageman's work before, "Brian the Comet" was a wonderful introduction, a delightful, funny, sad, and yes, brilliant, rumination on love, life, death, and everything in between, told with an unusually engaging creativity and tenderness. And be sure to read the character descriptions, themselves a work of flippantly saucy art.