You Better Sit Down: Salon Night Episode 3

Our play at The Flea Theater in April of this year, You Better Sit Down: Tales from My Parents' Divorce, was presented with a bunch of post-show Salon Nights. This podcast episode features original material that was created for those events. Mia Kaitgbak performs a monologue written by Jon Kern from an interview he did with his own mother, who is a divorce lawyer. Next up is a talk-back with the cast: Matt Maher, Caitlin Miller, Jennifer R. Morris, and Robbie Collier Sublett, who discuss what it was like to create the play and interview their own parents about the often sensitive topic of divorce. Then The Flea's Resident Acting Company, The Bats, perform live audience and online responses to the question, Was there an object in your or your parents' divorce that was highly contested? And last, Sam Bisbee performs a song he wrote.

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You Better Sit Down Salon Night, Part II

A talk-back with the cast of You Better Sit Down: Tales from My Parents' Divorce kicks off this week's episode. The show, which recently completed its New York premiere at the Flea Theater, featured actors Matt Maher, Caitlin Miller, Jennifer R. Morris, and Robbie Collier Sublett, who all interviewed their parents, and each plays his or her own parent (or parents). In the talk-back, they discuss the process of creating the show, talking about these topics with their parents, and their parents' reactions to the show. Then, The Flea Theater's resident acting company, The Bats, presents a short piece created from online and live audience responses that they put together during You Better Sit Down and performed after the play on the same night. Next is a monologue crafted from responses by our R&D Group artist Mia Rovegno and performed by Associate Artist Dan Domingues. The episode closes out with a song written and performed by Matt Berger.

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TALES FROM MY PARENTS' DIVORCE at Williamstown

TALES FROM MY PARENTS' DIVORCE has officially opened at Williamstown Theatre Festival, and we still have a weekend of performances to go! The actors, who all interviewed their own parents and in fact play their own parents, do a fantastic job of, dare I say, becoming their parents and telling the stories of building and dividing their families. Writer and actor Robbie Collier Sublett brought up another layer that the show offers during a talk-back after Tuesday's performance - which is that these actors witnessed a lot of these events as kids, and in fact, the stories that they're now telling had a major impact on shaping their childhoods. So it's all the more cathartic to be able to look at these events with the distance (all of the parents are over 20 years divorced at this point) that their parents' have been able to get over time.

The Boston Globe liked it, too, saying it's an "engrossing production" and applauding the actors' "impressive skill." Click HERE for the whole review!

And here are some wonderful program notes written by our most fabulous former Literary Associate, Rachel Lerner-Lay! The notes take a look at some of the statistics (with some great info-graphics) to accompany our stories of one of the wide-spread social phenomena in America today (click on it to enlarge).

And here's a photo of the theater....

And here's a photo of the set! (Note the dishwasher in the back - it really works!)

Congrats to all the cast and crew - break a leg this weekend, and we can't wait for the show to go up to ArtsEmerson in October!