←Recommendations of The Hot Tub Play

This was a delight to read with engaging characters and continually propulsive movement that took the play in new and exciting directions throughout. The premise of the hot tub meetup and Laura and Scott's "ex" connection is a perfect fodder for the humor that follows. Laura was a particularly unhinged, charming nucleus to the play!

I need everyone to understand that Lisa is consistently the funniest playwright working today. She is a master of comedic escalation, taking characters that feel so real and relatable through ever-increasing gauntlets of unexpected hilarity. Here, a chance meeting between two strangers with a mutual connection becomes a guffaw and espionage filled meet cute that I have never shipped harder in my life. Ruthlessly entertaining.

Gotta love a two-hander like this! Such terrific dialogue. It’s crisp and funny and so authentic. Laura is a hoot, a CIA employee straddling the line between creepy and sweet. And Scott, the “broken” artist whose initials spell SAD and who’s moved in with his mother after a couple of divorces. You will fall in love with these characters. I did!

Wow. That is a nice bit of dialogue. I really enjoyed reading this play. Its simplicity is just wonderful. If you're looking for an easy play to stage with minimal complications, this is it!!!

Wonderful work here. Simple premise with sharply drawn characters told so well! The multiple story threads connect through a common point of contact from the past. I absolutely love Laura - we all know someone who is almost like her (but not quite). Scott is a likeable foil. Great snappy dialogue keeps the action brisk and there are so many great laugh-out-loud moments - both through dialogue and scripted action, that the play breezes through its ninety minutes. Needs to be produced!

What a clever script this is! The wise-cracking banter between Laura and Scott reminds me so much of the old comedies with Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. Lisa Dellagiarino Feriend has a great sense of darkness and light and a humor that I love. I’m really impressed with THE HOT TUB PLAY — and I’m sure our fine feathered friends want it to soar onstage, too!

LDF may have created a new genre: jacuzzi noir! A hapless man encounters an uber-chatty femme fatale but neither is conventional, mostly because they're both SO conventional – regular people who knew each other a long time ago, one leaving a much bigger impression. Some people hold a grudge forever, others put it down and dust it off when the opportunity joins them a hot tub decades later. With sudden changes in temperature, this story's jets hit all the right places no matter where you soak!

[2025-06-09]
Lisa Delagiarino Feriend has done the impossible: She has made the idea of spending long stretches of time in a hot tub seem appealing.
Of course, it helps to have strong, dynamic characters, crackling dialogue and an inspired plot that make it easy to forget the dangers of pruning.
The fact that it's a two-hander is all the more impressive; Laura and Scott have a great dynamic that evolves naturally and to hilarious effect.
I loved this play and audiences no doubt will too.

Dellagiarino Feriend likes to challenge herself, in this case, by writing a two-hander set in a single setting, and in so doing, challenges her fellow playwrights to up their own writing. Fortunately, there is no such challenge to the audience, for THE HOT TUB PLAY is irresistible, adorable, a 40s screwball comedy without ever leaving the hot tub, a perfect re-meet cute.
The truly diabolical part is she makes it look so easy, while we in the know can revel in the craft it took to make it so.

The Hot Tub Play is a delightful comedy that so effectively commands your attention that you’re bound to stay in the pool (or tub) laughing until you’re pruny — in a good way! Lisa Dellagiarino Feriend takes on the challenge of writing a two-hander in a single location with aplomb and mastery - this is a hilarious, earnest, and surprising treat from start to finish.