The Department of Theater presents a weekend of intimate staged readings in the Bentley Theater. The series will include readings of Saturday Night/Sunday Morning, Katori Hall's moving and often hilarious portrait of a group of Black women in 1945 Memphis whose lives have been upended by World War II; Poor Clare, Chiara Atik's breathlessly funny modern spin on the Middle Ages and about what can happen when your eyes are opened to the injustice in the world; and Charlie O'Leary's Ridgeway, a ghost story about who can—and who cannot—live safely in rural America.

Poor Clare
by Chiara Atik 
directed by Peter Hackett
October 29 at 8 pm
Clare is just a regular noblewoman living in medieval Italy, trying out hairstyles and waiting to get married. Until an unkempt man named Francis starts ranting in the courtyard... A breathlessly funny & powerful spin on the Middle Ages that tells a very modern story of what happens when your eyes are opened to the injustice of the world around you - and you can no longer look away.

Ridgway
by Charlie O'Leary 
directed by Kareem Fahmy
October 30 at 8 pm
Decades ago in Western Pennsylvania, a gay love triangle ended in a murder in the woods - or so it's rumored. But when a white journalist brings his Latino partner home to investigate, the past and present start to look eerily similar. A ghost story about who can - and who can not - live safely in rural America.

This performance includes discussions of suicide.

Join playwright Charlie O'Leary and director Kareem Fahmy before the performance for a conversation about the play and the creative process; 7 pm in the Top of the Hop.

Saturday Night/Sunday Morning
by Katori Hall
directed by Kemati Janice Porter
October 31 at 5 pm
Miss Mary's Press and Curl beauty parlour and ladies boarding house, Memphis, Tennessee. As World War II draws to a close, a group of young Black women whose lives have been upended by war and shifting social attitudes must navigate the nuances of love, sexuality and sisterhood. A hysterical and achingly beautiful work from award-winning playwright Katori Hall.

KEMATI PORTER, KAREEM FAHMY, PETER HACKETT directors
MICHAEL GANIO scenic designer
LAURIE CHURBA costume designer
DAN KOTLOWITZ lighting designer
FABIAN OBISPO sound designer

Photo: Robert C. Strong II '04