Lauren Gunderson

Lauren Gunderson

Lauren M. Gunderson is one of the most produced playwrights in America since 2015 topping the list thrice including 2022/23. She is a two-time winner of the Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award for I and You and The Book of Will, the winner of the Lanford Wilson Award and the Otis Guernsey New Voices Award, a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, the Arthur L. Weissberger Award, and John Gassner Award for...
Lauren M. Gunderson is one of the most produced playwrights in America since 2015 topping the list thrice including 2022/23. She is a two-time winner of the Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award for I and You and The Book of Will, the winner of the Lanford Wilson Award and the Otis Guernsey New Voices Award, a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, the Arthur L. Weissberger Award, and John Gassner Award for Playwriting. Her musical adaptation of The Time Traveller’s Wife premiered on The West End last year. Revolutionary Women, her new anthology of five plays, was published by Bloomsbury in 2023. She studied Southern Literature and Drama at Emory University, and Dramatic Writing at NYU’s Tisch School where she was a Reynolds Fellow in Social Entrepreneurship. Her play The Catastrophist, about her husband virologist Nathan Wolfe, premiered digitally in January 2021 and is now in The COVID Art Capsule in the Library of Congress. She co-authored the Miss Bennet trilogy with Margot Melcon. The Half-Life of Marie Curie premiered off-Broadway and at Audible.com. Her work is published at Playscripts (I and You; Exit Pursued By A Bear; The Taming and Toil And Trouble), Dramatists Play Service (The Revolutionists; The Book of Will; Silent Sky; Bauer, Natural Shocks, The Wickhams and Miss Bennet) and Samuel French (Emilie). Her picture book Dr Wonderful: Blast Off to the Moon is available from Two Lions/Amazon. She is the book writer for musicals with Dave Stewart and Joss Stone (The Time Traveler’s Wife), Ari Afsar (Jeannette and I and You), Joriah Kwamé (Sinister), Kira Stone (Built for This) and Kait Kerrigan and Bree Lowdermilk (Justice and Earthrise). She is a board member of The Playwrights Foundation, and a member of the Aspen Institute Science and Society cohort. LaurenGunderson.com

Plays

  • Artemisia by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 3
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    Cast: 
    5–6
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    Genre: biography, drama + 2 more
    Genre: biography, drama, period, romantic comedy
    Artemisia Gentileschi was the most celebrated female painter of the 17th century, yet her name was all but lost for centuries. Attacked at just seventeen, publicly shamed and tortured to prove her truth, Gentileschi nevertheless fought for her art and the freedom to make it on her own terms. Always contending with her father, consumed with passion for her lover, and ferociously devoted to her children,...
    Artemisia Gentileschi was the most celebrated female painter of the 17th century, yet her name was all but lost for centuries. Attacked at just seventeen, publicly shamed and tortured to prove her truth, Gentileschi nevertheless fought for her art and the freedom to make it on her own terms. Always contending with her father, consumed with passion for her lover, and ferociously devoted to her children, Artemisia is a modern woman before her time. Artemisia is a work of humor and warmth that celebrates the courage, artistry, and humanity of a woman who attacked the glass ceiling with every brush stroke.
  • Trojan Women ATL* by Lauren Gunderson
    Cast: 
    5–6
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    Genre: drama
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    Keyword: sex trafficking, Ancient Greek tragedy + 4 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: sex trafficking, Ancient Greek tragedy, feminism, women's rights, Violence against women, cost of freedom
    TROJAN WOMEN ATL* is a play with 2 songs based on "Trojan Women" by Euripides. Four women are held in a room in a house not too far from where you are right now. They are captured, caught, forced to work at night, to work for Him. They are trafficked sex workers with no way out. One of them is not like the others, however, Cassandra is there to avenge her sister. Until then she bides her time,...
    TROJAN WOMEN ATL* is a play with 2 songs based on "Trojan Women" by Euripides. Four women are held in a room in a house not too far from where you are right now. They are captured, caught, forced to work at night, to work for Him. They are trafficked sex workers with no way out. One of them is not like the others, however, Cassandra is there to avenge her sister. Until then she bides her time, painting her nails, seeing a future no one else can see, waiting, waiting, waiting for the right moment to strike. Original new music by The Kilbanes.

    *Replace the last word of the title with your city’s airport abbreviation.

    "There is no single profile for trafficking victims; trafficking occurs to adults and minors in rural, suburban, or urban communities across the country. Victims of human trafficking have diverse socio-economic backgrounds, varied levels of education, and may be documented or undocumented." - Polaris Project
  • The Catastrophist by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 3
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    Cast: 
    1
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    Genre: biography, drama
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    Keyword: science, pandemic + 6 more
    Genre: biography, drama
    Keyword: science, pandemic, scientist, virology, fatherhood, judaism, athiesm, one person play
    How do you plan for a catastrophe? Virologist Nathan Wolfe, named one of TIME’s 100 Most Influential People in the World for his work tracking viral pandemic outbreaks, proposed pandemic insurance years before the novel coronavirus outbreak. No one bought it. Now, in a post-COVID world, we hear his story—presented as cinematic digital theatre. MTC Playwright in Residence Lauren Gunderson returns with a time-...
    How do you plan for a catastrophe? Virologist Nathan Wolfe, named one of TIME’s 100 Most Influential People in the World for his work tracking viral pandemic outbreaks, proposed pandemic insurance years before the novel coronavirus outbreak. No one bought it. Now, in a post-COVID world, we hear his story—presented as cinematic digital theatre. MTC Playwright in Residence Lauren Gunderson returns with a time-jumping tale based on the life and work of Nathan Wolfe (who also happens to be her husband). Though not a play about COVID19, it is a true story of a pandemic expert. An interactive deep dive into the profundities of scientific exploration and the harrowing realities of facing your own mortality, The Catastrophist is a world premiere theatrical experience built of and for this moment in time.
  • The Heath by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 5
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic + 1 more
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    Keyword: family, southern + 5 more
    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic, musical
    Keyword: family, southern, World War 2, Shakespeare, King Lear, banjo, science
    Lauren turns her storytelling on herself as she wrestles with how you make peace with a beloved relative who seems unlike you in every way. This beautiful, funny mediation on her South Carolinian grandfather's life draws on everything from Shakespeare's KING LEAR to Bluegrass banjo in a soul-stirring story of legacy, family, Alzheimers, World War 2, redemption, love, madness, and the science of memory...
    Lauren turns her storytelling on herself as she wrestles with how you make peace with a beloved relative who seems unlike you in every way. This beautiful, funny mediation on her South Carolinian grandfather's life draws on everything from Shakespeare's KING LEAR to Bluegrass banjo in a soul-stirring story of legacy, family, Alzheimers, World War 2, redemption, love, madness, and the science of memory.

    For scores for original music contact the author.
  • Earthrise by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    6
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    Genre: docudrama/historic, young audiences
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    Keyword: space, rockets + 1 more
    Genre: docudrama/historic, young audiences
    Keyword: space, rockets, musical
    Fun, Family Historical STEM Musical
    Music by Brian Lowdermilk, Lyrics by Kait Kerrigan

    The year is 1969, and while the world waits for the launch of Apollo 11, three children of key NASA employees — a mathematician’s daughter, an astronaut’s son and an engineer’s daughter — watch the historic launch from different perspectives. By dreaming a collective dream of landing on the moon together...
    Fun, Family Historical STEM Musical
    Music by Brian Lowdermilk, Lyrics by Kait Kerrigan

    The year is 1969, and while the world waits for the launch of Apollo 11, three children of key NASA employees — a mathematician’s daughter, an astronaut’s son and an engineer’s daughter — watch the historic launch from different perspectives. By dreaming a collective dream of landing on the moon together, the kids learn to understand the historic mission, not fear it. Commissioned and premiered at The Kennedy Center to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing in 2019.
  • Peter Pan and Wendy by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 8
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    Cast: 
    16–18
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    Genre: adaptation, adventure + 1 more
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    Keyword: Native American, feminist + 1 more
    Genre: adaptation, adventure, young audiences
    Keyword: Native American, feminist, family
    Bold, budding scientist Wendy Darling dreams of earning a Nobel Prize. When Peter Pan arrives at her bedroom window, she takes a leap and leaves finishing school behind, chasing adventure among the stars. Facing down fairies, mermaids, and the dastardly Captain Hook, Wendy, Peter, Tiger Lily, Tink and the Lost Boys discover the power of standing up together for what’s right. J.M. Barrie’s classic Peter Pan is...
    Bold, budding scientist Wendy Darling dreams of earning a Nobel Prize. When Peter Pan arrives at her bedroom window, she takes a leap and leaves finishing school behind, chasing adventure among the stars. Facing down fairies, mermaids, and the dastardly Captain Hook, Wendy, Peter, Tiger Lily, Tink and the Lost Boys discover the power of standing up together for what’s right. J.M. Barrie’s classic Peter Pan is reimagined for a new generation of theatregoers as a bright, charming, feminist, anti-colonial, empowering play for all ages.


  • Leap by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 2
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    Cast: 
    5
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    Genre: comedy, drama + 1 more
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    Keyword: science, Isaac Newton + 1 more
    Genre: comedy, drama, period
    Keyword: science, Isaac Newton, History
    Young Cambridge student, Isaac Newton, is sent home from London due to the plague closing the schools. While he is biding his time away in his family's small farm in rural England a pair of brilliant young sisters come to him with a strange and beguiling proposal. The play explores the inspiration for Newton's amazing discoveries in 1664 including gravity, optics, and calculus. Based on scientific and...
    Young Cambridge student, Isaac Newton, is sent home from London due to the plague closing the schools. While he is biding his time away in his family's small farm in rural England a pair of brilliant young sisters come to him with a strange and beguiling proposal. The play explores the inspiration for Newton's amazing discoveries in 1664 including gravity, optics, and calculus. Based on scientific and historical fact, Leap infuses myth, biography and science into a new story about one of Western culture's greatest minds. LEAP is an inventive synthesis of science, history, and a little bit of feminist magic.

    One of Gunderson's earliest science plays written while still an undergrad at Emory University.
  • The Book of Will by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 6
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    Cast: 
    10–20
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    Genre: comedy, drama + 1 more
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    Keyword: Shakespeare
    Genre: comedy, drama, period
    Keyword: Shakespeare
    THE STORY: Without William Shakespeare, we wouldn’t have literary masterpieces like Romeo and Juliet. But without Henry Condell and John Heminges, we would have lost half of Shakespeare’s plays forever. After the death of their friend and mentor, the two actors are determined to compile the First Folio and preserve the words that shaped their lives. They’ll just have to borrow, beg, and band together to get it...
    THE STORY: Without William Shakespeare, we wouldn’t have literary masterpieces like Romeo and Juliet. But without Henry Condell and John Heminges, we would have lost half of Shakespeare’s plays forever. After the death of their friend and mentor, the two actors are determined to compile the First Folio and preserve the words that shaped their lives. They’ll just have to borrow, beg, and band together to get it done. Amidst the noise and color of Elizabethan London, THE BOOK OF WILL finds an unforgettable true story of love, loss, and laughter, and sheds new light on a man you may think you know.
  • Natural Shocks - A One Woman Play in a Tornado by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 13
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    Cast: 
    1
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 2 more
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    Keyword: feminism, women + 4 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, political, tragedy
    Keyword: feminism, women, domestic violence, mother, gun violence, guns
    Based on Hamlet's "To be or not to be," NATURAL SHOCKS is a new 65-minute, one-woman tour-de-force play that bursts to life when we meet a woman waiting out an imminent tornado in her basement. She overflows with quirks, stories, and a final secret that puts the reality of guns in America in your very lap. The play is part confessional, part stand up, and part reckoning.
  • Ada and the Engine by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 4
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    Cast: 
    4–6
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    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic + 2 more
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    Keyword: science, women in science + 6 more
    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic, drama, period
    Keyword: science, women in science, technology, Ada Lovelace, computers, Lord Byron, Charles Babbage, 19th century
    As the British Industrial Revolution dawns, young Ada Byron Lovelace (daughter of the flamboyant and notorious Lord Byron) sees the boundless creative potential in the “analytic engines” of her friend and soul-mate, Charles Babbage, inventor of the first mechanical computer. Ada envisions a whole new world where art and information converge – a world she might not live to see. A music-laced story of love,...
    As the British Industrial Revolution dawns, young Ada Byron Lovelace (daughter of the flamboyant and notorious Lord Byron) sees the boundless creative potential in the “analytic engines” of her friend and soul-mate, Charles Babbage, inventor of the first mechanical computer. Ada envisions a whole new world where art and information converge – a world she might not live to see. A music-laced story of love, friendship, and the edgiest dreams of the future. Jane Austen meets Steve Jobs in this poignant pre-tech romance heralding the computer age. Original music by The Kilbanes on request.
    More at: adaplay.tumblr.com
  • Fire Work by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 2
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    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: adventure, drama + 1 more
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    Keyword: feminist, chemistry + 4 more
    Genre: adventure, drama, romantic comedy
    Keyword: feminist, chemistry, pacifism, war, women and war, female empowerment
    FIRE WORK is a present day romance set in a place where the conflict between social conformity and individual freedom turns deadly serious. Ben meets Ana in her father’s retail fireworks shop and the sparks quickly fly between the two. It's a comedy until it's not. When a bomb goes off in their town, the young lovers wrestle with their chances at freedom and escape, and the tension and secrets that...
    FIRE WORK is a present day romance set in a place where the conflict between social conformity and individual freedom turns deadly serious. Ben meets Ana in her father’s retail fireworks shop and the sparks quickly fly between the two. It's a comedy until it's not. When a bomb goes off in their town, the young lovers wrestle with their chances at freedom and escape, and the tension and secrets that are let loose in their war-torn city.
  • The Revolutionists by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 8
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    Cast: 
    4
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    Genre: biography, comedy + 3 more
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    Keyword: French Revolution, Marie Antoinette + 2 more
    Genre: biography, comedy, dark comedy, docudrama/historic, period
    Keyword: French Revolution, Marie Antoinette, feminism, women's history
    THE REVOLUTIONISTS is a brutal comedic quartet about four very real women who lived boldly in France during the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror (1793-1794). Playwright Olympe De Gouge, assassin Charlotte Corday, and former queen (and fan of ribbons) Marie Antoinette, and Haitian rebel Marianne Angelle hang out, murder Marat, loose their heads, and try to beat back the extremist insanity in revolutionary...
    THE REVOLUTIONISTS is a brutal comedic quartet about four very real women who lived boldly in France during the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror (1793-1794). Playwright Olympe De Gouge, assassin Charlotte Corday, and former queen (and fan of ribbons) Marie Antoinette, and Haitian rebel Marianne Angelle hang out, murder Marat, loose their heads, and try to beat back the extremist insanity in revolutionary Paris.

    This grand and dream-tweaked comedy is about violence and legacy, feminism and terrorism, art and how we actually go about changing the world.

    It a true story.
    Or total fiction.
    Or a play about a play.
    Or a raucous resurrection that ends in a song and a scaffold.

    more research and info here: therevolutionists.tumblr.com
  • The Taming by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: comedy, farce
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    Keyword: women, LGBTQ + 7 more
    Genre: comedy, farce
    Keyword: women, LGBTQ, History, American history, Founding Fathers, liberal, conservative, Lesbian, feminism
    A crackling modern political all-female farce, THE TAMING hilariously takes on America’s overheated political rhetoric and upends historical truths about our founding fathers. When a conservative senatorial aid, a liberal political activist, and a very sparkly GA beauty queen find themselves locked in a hotel room, the political passions of these slightly insane women prove they might just be revolutionary...
    A crackling modern political all-female farce, THE TAMING hilariously takes on America’s overheated political rhetoric and upends historical truths about our founding fathers. When a conservative senatorial aid, a liberal political activist, and a very sparkly GA beauty queen find themselves locked in a hotel room, the political passions of these slightly insane women prove they might just be revolutionary geniuses.

    Initially inspired by The Taming of The Shrew, THE TAMING grew out of her desire to wrestle with potent elements inside the Bard’s playful and problematic battle of the sexes. Inside the heightened, cheerfully absurd world of THE TAMING the play spanks America’s insidious, sound bite politics with the switch of actual history and proves Shakespeare’s point that true debate is hot.

    Third in Lauren’s The Shakespeare Cycle and commissioned by Crowded Fire Theatre, THE TAMING takes the sass, sex, and banter from Shakespeare TAMING OF THE SHREW and tags in modern American politics.

    Chad Jones’s Best of The Bay 2013: “One of the year’s smartest, slyest, most enjoyable evenings.”

    Sam Hurwitt’s A Year of Living Theatrically: “So many hysterical lines in the play that you’d hardly finish laughing at one before the next hit you.”

    thetamingplay.tumblr.com

    Available in full at www.playscripts.com/play/2735
  • I and You by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 13
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 1 more
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    Keyword: teenagers, life and death + 6 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama
    Keyword: teenagers, life and death, illness, Whitman, poetry, surprise ending, coming of age, youth
    Winner of the 2014 Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award and finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Playwrighting Prize, I AND YOU is a haunting, shocking music-box of a play about youth, poetry, hope, heart, and the connections between us all.

    More at: iandyouplay.tumblr.com

    One afternoon in your town, Anthony arrives at Caroline’s door bearing waffle fries, a beat-up copy of Walt Whitman...
    Winner of the 2014 Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award and finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Playwrighting Prize, I AND YOU is a haunting, shocking music-box of a play about youth, poetry, hope, heart, and the connections between us all.

    More at: iandyouplay.tumblr.com

    One afternoon in your town, Anthony arrives at Caroline’s door bearing waffle fries, a beat-up copy of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, and an urgent assignment from their high school lit teacher. Living most of her life online, Caroline is sick and hasn’t been to school is months, but she is as quick and sardonic as Anthony is athletic and popular. As these two let down their guards and share their secrets, this seemingly vanilla poetry assignment unlocks a much deeper mystery that has brought them together. I AND YOU is a valentine to life, love, and the strange and surprising beauty of human connectedness.
  • The Amazing Adventures of Dr. Wonderful (And Her Dog!) by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 5
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    Cast: 
    4
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    Genre: adventure, comedy + 2 more
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    Keyword: science, girls + 2 more
    Genre: adventure, comedy, musical, young audiences
    Keyword: science, girls, stem, educational
    Fly through the solar system with Dr. Wonderful and her amazing team of Newton (the dog), Ben (the human), and Mom (the Mom)! Girl-detective-noir meets science-geek-chic in this super cool astronomical musical theater event that will take you across the universe with fun, flair, and science. Music by Brian Lowdermilk.
  • By and By by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 4
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    Cast: 
    4
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    Genre: drama, experimental + 2 more
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    Keyword: science, cloning + 4 more
    Genre: drama, experimental, mystery/thriller, science fiction
    Keyword: science, cloning, loss, fathers, daughters, responsibility
    BY AND BY is a heavy-on-the-science sci-fi thriller about a father, the edge of technology, and the lengths we go to for love. The play provides a wild and challenging doubled-role for an actress to pull off a bit of a coup-de-theatre at the end.
    Steven is a nerd of a father who's daughter Denise has just found out that she is very, VERY special. Denise breaks from her father after hearing this...
    BY AND BY is a heavy-on-the-science sci-fi thriller about a father, the edge of technology, and the lengths we go to for love. The play provides a wild and challenging doubled-role for an actress to pull off a bit of a coup-de-theatre at the end.
    Steven is a nerd of a father who's daughter Denise has just found out that she is very, VERY special. Denise breaks from her father after hearing this news, running away to find out for herself who (and how) she is. As Steven chases after his daughter across the northeast he is met/haunted by his wife, the woman he lost all those years ago, the woman who's love he's been trying to recreate.
    In the end Steven is forced to let go of everything or risk losing both the memory of his wife and the bright future of his daughter. A play about the threat of edgy science turns out to be a play about how even the people we've lost continue to make us better people if we let them.
  • Silent Sky by Lauren Gunderson
    Recommendations: 6
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    Cast: 
    5
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    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic + 3 more
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    Keyword: science, women in science + 8 more
    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic, drama, period, romantic comedy
    Keyword: science, women in science, astronomy, feminism, suffragettes, women, Sisters, god, music, piano
    Astonishing discoveries await Henrietta Leavitt as she maps distant stars in galaxies beyond our own. But this brilliant, headstrong pioneer must struggle for recognition in the man’s world of turn-of-the-century astronomy. In this musical blend of science, history, family ties, and fragile love, a passionate young woman must map her own passage through a society determined to keep a woman in her place. This...
    Astonishing discoveries await Henrietta Leavitt as she maps distant stars in galaxies beyond our own. But this brilliant, headstrong pioneer must struggle for recognition in the man’s world of turn-of-the-century astronomy. In this musical blend of science, history, family ties, and fragile love, a passionate young woman must map her own passage through a society determined to keep a woman in her place. This true story dives into the romance, wonder and sisterhood of science in the early 20th century female “computers” at Harvard Observatory.

    Jane Chambers Award top Finalist 2013.

    See research, pictures, essays, and more about the play: silentskyplay.tumblr.com