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If were being ruthlessly glass-half-full about it, the ephemerality of theater is what makes it so damn hardy.
They went into limbo.
Which Broadway musicals would have made an impact?
Which Off Broadway premieres would have guided the conversation?
Theres more to theater than just intellectual companionship, though.
During the Lost Season, certain designs, certain songs, certain performances would have been our touchstones.
What would have made us feel strong?
Who would have made us look inward?
I have hazarded a guess at the productions that might have been the keystones of the Lost Season.
We cant tell if shes dreaming or if her mind is crumbling from strain.
Characters are constantly talking about money, but in Maries visions, we get a true sense of whatcosts.
Santiago started writingThe Siblings Playin 2010.
She was in acting classes where every character she was asked to play seemed alien.
The first scene Santiago wrote was the plays second.
(When she showed it in an after-school playwriting workshop, she hid under the table.
Thurber had to physically drag her out to watch it.)
He enters furious, having just violently broken up his sisters woozy attempt to trade sex for drugs.
Shes an overwhelmed and fraying 17-year-old, desperate to shed at least one of herburdens her virginity will do.
Logan had ambition for his children.
Santiago wrote about Butchie and Leon and Marie because I had trouble relating to my peers, she says.
The reason was to let people know Im not lying.
She too has had moments of watching people walk through her walls.
I thought my symptoms were supernatural, Santiago says.
I thought I was being haunted or a demon was chasing me.
But when I articulated that to Lucy and Jenna, they said no, thats part of your history.
You just dont have the language for that mental injury.
It was my apology to him for leaving.
Even though the show never opened, it did have a virtual run online.
The online version ofThe Siblings Playclosed on April 5.
According to Topol, the show managed to sell 740 virtual tickets.
So now, the production is a chimera part real, part digital.
An audience did get to see it, for the scheduled length of its run.
But has it … premiered?
For Santiago and director Jenna Worsham, the show is both dead and alive.
They think about the set, still standing, shut away and quiet.
Waiting to be torn down.
What would we have talked about ifThe Siblings Playhad opened?
Well, for one thing, it would have made Ferro a star.
Teens would have passed out in the aisles.
It would have been the Year of Ferro.
It would have been his time.
