Darlin’

A World Premiere
By Michelle Carter

A poignant, time-hopping tapestry that explores the fierce, funny, and often fraught bonds between mothers and daughters spanning generations. This is a story about finding freedom in establishing who we are at our core—sometimes in spite of, sometimes because of, the tangled relationships that bind us. At its heart, this play is a moving meditation on the search for connection and understanding—how the secrets we keep, the words we withhold, and the histories we inherit shape who we are. With wit and raw honesty, we witness the messy beauty of family: the longing to be seen, the ache of forgiveness, and the liberating power of finally standing strong in our own truth.

Bios

Barbara Pitts received a Carbonell Award nomination for her performance in the national tour of Tectonic Theater Project’s Here There Are Blueberries (McCarter, Wallis in LA, Berkeley Rep, Miami New Drama, Seattle Rep). Barbara is co-author of MOMENT WORK: Tectonic Theater Project’s Process of Devising Theater and co-created and performed in Tectonic’s The Laramie Project (BAM, Lincoln Center, Union Square Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, Berkeley Rep, and the HBO film, which shared an Emmy nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay). Recent and favorite theater credits include The Price (Shakespeare & Co.), Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Mona Pinot’s Baseball It Is, Chris O’Connor’s The Gentleman from Philly (Mile Square Theatre, NJ), Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire (Triad Stage, NC), Adam Bock’s The Typographer’s Dream, and Leigh Fondakowski’s The People’s Temple (Berkeley Rep, The Guthrie). TV credits include Law & Order: SVU, Person of Interest, Forever, Kidnapped, 30 Rock, One Life to Live, As the World Turns, Law & Order, Comedy Central’s Pulp Comics, and three seasons as Aunt Jodie in the multi-award-winning Anyone But Me (anyonebutmeseries.com). Barbara has devised and invested in works with social change impact, including heretooproject.com, Ethan Katz’s Where the Yetis Will Be, the short film Young Claude, and the current Broadway run of Here There Are Blueberries.

Amanda Duarte is a NY-based writer-performer currently vibrating in carbon and recently seen as a perineum in Snatch Adams and Tainty McCracken Present It’s That Time of the Month at Soho Rep (Obie Award). Other shows include Datura at various cabaret venues, Staying Alive and Adrienne Truscott’s Asking For It at Joe’s Pub, and the long-running cult favorite Dead Darlings (“Absolute Best Reading Series in New York” — NY Mag) at Judson, currently enjoying a renaissance in Kingston, New York. She is proud to be included in the Museum of Hoaxes for her work with Mike Albo on the “Hurt Locker: The Musical” Playbill for Hedwig on Broadway, and to be an Oxford Word of the Year nominee for #PussyGrabsBack. She is honored to once again collaborate with her longtime friend Michelle Carter, having previously appeared in her play How to Pray.

Phil Mansfield is thrilled to be working with the creatives at Bridge Street Theatre. A native of Manhattan, Phil began acting professionally as a child in television, commercials, and regional theater. He attended the original “Fame” school, the High School of Performing Arts. As a young adult, he went on to do more TV work (Another World, All My Children, TV Land interstitials, Nickelodeon’s Weinerville, plus other “Nick” bits) and regional theater nationwide, including several original works with George C. Wolfe. Recent work includes Duke Senior in As You Like It, Lord Montague in Romeo and Juliet with Catskill Mountain Shakespeare, and George Antrobus in The Skin of Our Teeth and Chekhov’s Three Sisters with Voice Theatre. Phil’s day job in the Hudson Valley as a lifestyle photographer (The New York Times, Architectural Digest, Food & Wine…) is supplemented by his passion for teaching at the Culinary Institute of America.

Katy Early (Director) directs and develops new work in New York, New England, and beyond. She works in theater, musical theater, and opera, with recent credits at The Tank, the cell theatre, City Lyric Opera, and MassOpera, in addition to several developmental projects. As an arts leader, she has served as the associate artistic director of Catalyst New Music, a new music incubator in Boston, since 2022. Together with playwright Annie Rasiel, she recently launched the Brooklyn artist collective Scoby NYC. www.katyearly.com

Michelle Carter (Author) is a two-time recipient of the PEN USA Award in Drama. She has also received the Susan Glaspell Award, the Ebell Playwright Prize, the PEN West Award, Backstage West’s Garland Award, and a Susan Smith Blackburn Prize nomination, as well as an NEA Literature Fellowship. She has held residencies at Berkeley Repertory Theater’s Ground Floor, the Donmar Warehouse in London, the Cite Internationale des Arts in Paris, and the Fine Arts Work Center, Provincetown. Her plays have been produced and developed at the Moscow Art Theater, the Donmar Warehouse, the Playwrights Horizons SuperLab, Arcola Theatre, Centenary Stage Company, Center Theater Group, Kirk Douglas Theatre, Asolo Repertory Theatre, Abingdon Theatre, Shotgun Players, Aurora Theatre, Magic Theatre, Symmetry Theatre, AlterTheater, Bridge Street Theatre, the New York Summer Play Festival, and the Grimeborn Opera Festival in London, among others. Music theater and dance theater projects include DREAMSPIEL, a Ukulele Opera (libretto, lyrics) with the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain at Arcola Theatre, London; AFTER ALL, Part I, at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts; and IRON SHOES (book), with Erika Chong Shuch and Kitka, at Shotgun Players.