Vittoria Orlando

Isla

August 19, 2026

"Isla," the new musical-theater piece from Hit the Lights! Company now at WP Theater, is one of those productions in which the eye is continually rewarded while the mind is left waiting for the story to catch up. It is an act of love, remembrance, and theatrical ingenuity, inspired by the family history of co-artistic director Samantha Blain, whose mother and two aunts fled Cuba in 1969, during the early years of Fidel Castro’s regime, in search of freedom and a new life in the United States. Co-directed by Blain’s colleagues Roman Sanchez and Mikayla Stanley, and assembled collaboratively from family stories, recorded interviews, music, projection, movement, and puppetry, Isla possesses an almost tactile sincerity. Yet sincerity is not the same thing as dramatic necessity. The production has been given an abundance of means for telling its story; what it lacks is a sufficiently compelling story to tell with them. [more]

Camping

June 26, 2026

What emerges over time is not merely a friendship but one of the most intricate love stories currently playing in New York. Ari and Brit have been entwined since birth, neighbors in a trailer park, companions through every formative humiliation and triumph. They know one another with an intimacy that exceeds romance even as it continually gestures toward it. Their connection exists in that difficult territory where friendship, devotion, desire, resentment, dependence, and yearning become impossible to separate. Theater often struggles to depict such relationships without reducing them to categories. Barclay refuses simplification. The result feels startlingly true. [more]

The Mall The Mall The Mall

March 7, 2026

"The Mall The Mall The Mall" is a magical realist comedy about three teenagers traversing a suburban mall in search of stolen fandom merchandise. Along the way, they encounter a coterie of increasingly strange antagonists and have some surprisingly sincere moments of self-discovery. The script, from writer Philip Kenner ("BOYSTUFF," "Stand & Repent"), is quite sharp. The directing from James Wyrwicz ("Is This a Theater Of Love?," "I Love You Jesus Christ!") is wickedly funny, with blocking that brings out the humor of the script while letting the emotional beats still land as they should. Kurt Cruz’ sound design adds quite a lot of comedy as well. [more]

Randy’s Dandy Coaster Castle

August 26, 2022

Part of Ramón’s game plan to increase attendance is to create a Randy’s Dandy Coaster Castle mascot. In a move that changes his life, Arlo is drafted to don a hilarious, smelly rat costume transforming himself into the character Kuddly Kyle. Suddenly Arlo, the sweet, directionless shlub has found meaning in his life via this subterfuge. While in the costume, Arlo is the delightfully entertaining Kyle. Without the costume, he’s just Arlo. This is the most moving part of Coaster, a play that revolves around the emotions and inner lives of these everyday, working class characters, beautifully evoked by Perez and carefully chaperoned by director, Rebecca Martínez to keep it all down to earth and accessible. The fade-out is particularly moving as the workers have no idea that there is a disaster looming. Their lives will be changed—for the worse. [more]