Joan H. Gillings Center for Dramatic Art | playmakersrep.org | 919.962.7529

Letter from Viv. Vivienne Benesch, Producing Artistic Director

Welcome to The Wolves!

If The Royale asked us to step into the ring, The Wolves invites us onto the turf. Sarah DeLappe’s exhilarating play drops us right into the pre-game huddles, warm-ups, and sideline chatter of a high school girls’ soccer team. But as anyone who has ever played a sport, or watched closely, knows, what happens on the field is never just about the game. Beneath the drills and banter are questions of belonging, resilience, identity, and the fragile, fierce bond that holds a team together.

We are thrilled to have Aubrey Snowden, Department of Dramatic Art faculty and PRC company member, direct this production. She and her wonderful creative team have brought to the process all the rigor, playfulness, imagination and care that the script demands, and under her guidance, our extraordinary ensemble has built a world that is both unique and universal, deeply funny and quietly profound.

This team is a shining example of what makes PlayMakers so distinctive: being a bridge between the highest level of academic training and professional artistry. On this stage, students from our graduate programs and undergraduate department learn and stretch their craft in a fully professional setting, alongside resident and guest artists who share their expertise and experience, while audiences get to witness the spark that happens when education and excellence converge in real time.

It’s no accident that The Wolves sits at the center of our “Fall Madness” lineup, a trio of plays that invite sports into the theater in surprising and moving ways. I hope you got to/will catch our Mobile production of King James that carries this exploration of athletics and identity into communities across the Triangle, tracing how basketball fandom shapes friendship, memory, and love. Together with The Royale, these three plays ask what happens when the physicality, spectacle, and spirit of sports meet the intimacy, reflection, and imagination of theatre.

Thank you for joining us on this journey. I hope The Wolves makes you laugh, think, and reminds you of your own version of “the team”—whatever form it took in your life.

See you on the field,

Vivienne

Friends of PlayMakers

Corporate and Foundation Partners

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We are so glad you have chosen to be here with us as we explore our new season of Theatre That Moves and what exactly that means to us, our bodies, and minds. We will be delving into the idea of how we act as a team, and while it is often said that there is no ‘I’ in the word, it seems beneficial to understand the individual elements that allow us to be stronger together. Our cross-campus collaborations have been something I am proud of, previously on the topic of mental health and now around the links between art and sport. At PlayMakers we seek to facilitate and enhance the understanding of other perspectives and belief systems and how they align with our own, if at all. More than ever, connecting with the experience of others, both on stage and with fellow audience members, can be illuminating.

I am personally very grateful to our Producing Artistic Director for being a fearless leader and to the incredible team she has built, both staff and volunteers. I have come to know Viv as a human who loves to initiate productive dialogue with incredibly insightful and instinctive talent. She has brought us pieces of art that have been uncannily on point for our time, and I cannot wait to see her perform in Macbeth. It is my hope that you believe that what we do here at PlayMakers matters. I hope that we can count on your support as we continue to bring you meaningful stories that you find inspiring, entertaining and transforming — in short, stories that move you. Join us on our journey through another spectacular season, as patrons, as donors, as ambassadors. We are grateful for every single one of you, and hope you continue to cheer us on.

Peace,

Jackie Tanner, Chair

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PlayMakers Advisory Council

Jackie Tanner, Chair

Betsy Blackwell, Patrick Brennan, Deborah Gerhardt, Susan Gross, Amy Guskiewicz, C. Hawkins, Zach Howell, Lillian Jenks, Duncan Lascelles, Stuart Lascelles, Robert Long, emeritus, Graig Meyer, Julie Morris, Paula Noell, Jodi Patalano, Diane Robertson, Wyndham Robertson, Haley Swindal, Jennifer Werner, Mike Wiley

About the Author

Sarah DeLappe was born (along with twin sister, Eva) in Reno, Nevada in 1990. She attended Yale as an undergraduate and received her MFA in playwriting from Brooklyn College (2017). Her writing mentors have included Paula Vogel and Mac Wellman. Her play, The Wolves premiered in 2016 and was produced Off-Broadway and at Lincoln Center Theater. It was a Pulitzer Prize finalist and won the Relentless Award and the Sky Cooper New American Play Prize. Sarah currently works in film as a producer and writer, known for Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022), Cassandra at the Wedding and The Regime (2024).

Program Notes

Contemplating American Promise and Privilege: Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves at PlayMakers

By Mark Perry, Dramaturg

In our DRAM 231 course here at UNC, our young playwriting students do an exercise where they go eavesdrop on conversations around them and transcribe what they hear. What they bring back rarely resembles the coherent, forward-moving dialogue of a typical play. Real life conversation is full of interruption, inarticulation, digression, and repetition. Layers develop as several topics are carried along. The banal mixes with the profound; the truly traumatic is treated ironically, and deep feeling wells up in few words or simple silence. The French coined a term in the late 19^th Century for writing that sought to capture such natural interactions: “tranche de vie” or “slice of life.”

Playwright Sarah DeLappe was eavesdropping when the impulse to write The Wolves struck. It was the summer of 2014, and she was at a museum exhibit in New York City featuring contemporary Iranian, Iraqi and Syrian artists. The casual and detached manner which the posh attendees spoke about and veered away from the urgent representation of the artists’ lives in these devastated societies stirred in the 24-year-old a creative fury. By the time she left the museum and got on the subway, DeLappe had begun to conceive a scenario, and on the ride home she typed out the play’s extensive first scene—on her phone.

The Wolves is not about posh New Yorkers, but it is about American Exceptionalism. To reflect on this, DeLappe turned to a world she knew well for her setting—girls’ soccer, and her central character would not be an individual, but an ensemble. The play features a dazzling display of slice of life dialogue among nine American high school girls on an indoor club soccer team. Each player, with their different temperament, is identified not by their name, but by their number—that is, what you as audience member see on the back of their jerseys. This ensemble is in many ways emblematic of “Middle America”—as the girls tentatively label it—in its aspirations and insecurities, in its promise and privilege, in its profound delusion and collective ADHD, and ultimately in its power if only it will yield to its unity.

DeLappe has spoken about how she thought of her work as “musical scoring” and “orchestration”. The script in fact can be quite challenging to understand because of this. Certain pages of the script have as many as five columns, representing five separate, simultaneous conversations happening at once. And yet, the play, since its premiere in 2016 has enjoyed scores of productions in theatres big and small. There are currently over twenty productions scheduled for the 2025-2026 season.

Saying that, The Wolves would seem an unusual choice for a PlayMakers’ show, given that its dramatis personae is made up (almost) entirely of 16- and 17-year-old girls. PlayMakers features a resident company considerably older than that. The play would seem instead a perfect choice for university undergraduate theatre, where the bulk of auditionees are 18-, 19- and 20-year-old young women, only a handful of years removed from the “Wolves”. And indeed, the play is a current favorite of university, and even high school, theatres. Our Kenan Theatre Company did a dynamic production of the play in 2018 with Aubrey Snowden directing, who also directs this PlayMakers’ production and who herself was captain of her soccer team at an all-girls prep school. Professor Snowden, who has since joined the faculty at the UNC Department of Dramatic Art, has sought not just to recreate that show but to build up from the virtues of the current cast. This ensemble features all six women in the Department’s MFA acting program, also known as PATP or “Professional Actor Training Program”. The cast is rounded out with an undergraduate, a recent alumna, and a graduate student from a different discipline. Two undergraduates serve as understudies, and two PlayMakers’ staff members as “swings.”

With a company of 20-somethings, PlayMakers is seeking an optimal balance between acting experience and youthful believability. The show’s athleticism requires a further stretch, if you will. Rehearsal for this production looks at times like soccer practice. At other times, it feels more like a leadership or team building seminar. Assisting Aubrey Snowden in these regards is Shelley Johnson, a leadership consultant especially experienced in the sports field and a former Executive Director of the Carolina Leadership Academy in the UNC Department of Athletics.

Sports on Stage

“Sports are the front porch of the university. It’s not the most important room in the house, but it is the most visible.” – Scott Barnes

The University of North Carolina is famous, and occasionally notorious, for its athletics. The University also has many respectable artistic programs and offerings, such as PlayMakers Repertory Company. The scale of engagement and commerce, however, are not comparable. More people attended the UNC-TCU football game in Kenan Stadium on September 1 than will see PRC’s entire 2025-2026 season of plays, not to mention the 6 to 7 million who watched that game on TV.

This is not to belittle the arts, where the impact can be more substantive and where the desired outcome—both introspective and civilizing—requires communal intimacy. This is just to clarify the different worlds–two worlds that Vivienne Benesch and PlayMakers’ artistic staff are striving to combine in some of this fall season’s offerings: with boxing in The Royale and soccer in The Wolves.

Having a play centered on sports practice and featuring warmups and drills introduces a special challenge for theatre performers. Not only do the actors need to learn their tricky parts in the staccato-scoring of the dialogue, not only must they come to inhabit the particular nuances of their player’s young self, they must also practice their soccer moves enough that muscle memory takes over and there is no interruption in the audience’s suspension of disbelief, such that we may be brought through the cacophony and banter and ball-bouncing to the rhythm of the play’s heart. There we may reflect on the pitfalls of American exceptionalism and the inherent potential in young people—and young women, in particular—to transcend the cult of extreme individualism.

Teenage girls acting as a unit represent a potent force. That force can channel the maenadic power to dismember—consider the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 or the screeching Rock ’n Roll fans of the 1950s and 1960s. Consider the phenomenon of “Mean Girls.” There is certainly potential for that destructive energy present on this team, especially as cliques among them target weaker individuals.

There is also the power to bond, to bolster, to elevate. U.S. Women’s Soccer legend Abby Wambach advocates such an approach in her book, Wolfpack: “We not only won, we were champions of each other.” As the all-time leading scorer on the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team, Wambach not only helped lead her time to Olympic Gold (2004, 2012) and a World Cup (2015), but she worked for pay equity for her teammates. Her book’s subtitle speaks it plainly: “How to Come Together, Unleash Our Power and Change the Game.”

The young teammates of the “Wolves” are negotiating two broad options. The zero-sum game of competitive sport clashes with its golden ethic of solidarity and team spirit. Will anxiety and a sense of scarcity divide them or will they bind together in a more principled mindset of abundance?

The Wolves, in combining the collectivist impulses of theatre and sports, provides a supreme opportunity for ensemble building. The play’s effect relies on the energetic ensemble’s interplay, and its apotheosis is the transformation of nine isolated and fragile egos into a single, fierce and fearless pack.

We are the wolves

We are the wolves!

WE ARE THE WOLVES!

The Wolves

by Sarah DeLappe

Directed by Aubrey Snowden

Scenic Designer
Yi-Hsuan (Ant) Ma

Costume Designer
Pamela A. Bond

Lighting Designer
Abigail Hoke-Brady

Sound Designer
Daniel Baker

Vocal Coach
Tia James

Dramaturg
Mark Perry

Stage Manager
Aspen Blake Jackson

Assistant Stage Manager
Sarah Smiley

Assistant Director
Shelley Johnson

October 8 – 26, 2025

The Wolves is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals on behalf of Samuel French, INC. www.concordtheatricals.com

World premiere produced by The Playwrights Realm (Katherine Kovner, Artistic Director/Roberta Pereira Producing Director) on September 8, 2016 and remounted on December 5, 2016 by special arrangement with Scott Rudin and Eli Bush.

Originally presented by New York Stage and Film and Vassar in the Powerhouse Season, Summer 2016.

Playwrights Horizons Theatre School produced a workshop of The Wolves in 2015 in association with Clubbed Thumb, where the play had been developed previously.

Winner of the 2016 Sky Cooper New American Play Prize at Marin Theatre Company, Mill Valley, CA

Jasson Minadakis, Artistic Director; Keri Kellerman, Managing Director

Produced by Lincoln Center Theater, New York City, 2017

The videotaping or making of electronic or other audio and/or visual recordings of this production and distributing recordings or streams in any medium, including the internet, is strictly prohibited, a violation of the author(s)’s rights and actionable under United States copywright law. For more information, please visit:

https://concordtheatricals.com/resources/protecting-artists

This production of The Wolves is made possible by a generous gift from Alan Weinhouse (BSBA ’77)

The Professional Theatre of the Department of Dramatic Art Kathryn Hunter-Williams, Chair, Vivienne Benesch, Producing Artistic Director Produced in association with the College of Arts and Sciences The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Actor Bios

in Alphabetical Order

#2: Swetha Anand
#7: Elizabeth Dye
#11: Delaney Jackson
#8: Jadah Johnson
#25: Lily Kays
Soccer Mom: Dana Marks
#14: Caroline Marques
#46: Celeste Pelletier
#13: Katie Stevens
#00: Mengwe Wapimewah

Stage Managers: Aspen Blake Jackson* Sarah Smiley*

*Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.

UNDERSTUDIES

Understudies never substitute for listed players unless a specific announcement is made for the appearance at the time of performance.

#00, #25, #46 – Gabriela Hinckle

#14, #2, #8 – Ali Patalano

#11, #7, #13 – Sydney Patterson

Swing – Chelsea James

Swing – Hannah LaMarlowe

Setting: An indoor soccer field somewhere in suburban America. Winter. Saturdays.

Time Period: 2010s

The Wolves will be performed no intermission.

Swetha Anand

#2

PlayMakers: Debut.

University: Hookman (Company Carolina); Heathers (Company Carolina/Pauper Players); Men on Boats (Kenan Theatre Company).

Education: Third year undergraduate student at UNC Chapel Hill double majoring in Psychology and Dramatic Art.

Elizabeth Dye

#7

PlayMakers: Company member in their third year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art. Little Shop of Horrors, Confederates, Death of a Salesman, The Christmas Case of Hezekiah Jones, Crumbs from the Table of Joy, The Game, Much Ado About Nothing. The Taming, Stupid F**king Bird (PlayMakers/DDA Ground Floor).

University: Cabaret, Animal Farm, Three Sisters, Violet, Henry IV Part One (University of Evansville)

Education:BFA Theatre Performance at the University of Evansville.

Delaney Jackson

#11

PlayMakers: Debut. Company member in their first year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art.

Regional: Scissoring, Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Betties (Voices In Alliance); As You Like It, Julius Caesar, Much Ado About Nothing (Old School Shakespeare Omaha); Twelfth Night: Or What You Will (Benson Theatre); King Lear, R3³ (BLUEBARN Theatre); It’s A Wonderful Life (The Rose Theater).

Film: Wed the Dark (Shoot Montana).

Education: BA in Theatre from the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

Jadah Johnson

#8

PlayMakers: Company member in their third year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art. Death of a Salesman, The Christmas Case of Hezekiah Jones, Crumbs from the Table of Joy, The Game (u/s perf.), Much Ado About Nothing. Stupid F**king Bird (PlayMakers/DDA Ground Floor).

Regional: Too Heavy For Your Pocket (New Horizon Theatre)

Education:B.A Theatre Arts Performance and Practices at Point Park University.

Lily Kays

#25

PlayMakers: Debut.

Film: Libations, Brina (Adynaton Productions), The Farm (Columbia University).

University: Dog Sees God, She Kills Monsters, Antigone.

Dana Marks

Soccer Mom

PlayMakers: Debut. Dana Marks is a international performer, theatre teacher and director. Managing Director of Little Green Pig Theatrical Concern (2005-2019).

Touring: Curtis Eller’s American Circus.

Teaching: 12 years in the Theater Studies Department of Duke University teaching acting (Meisner) and movement and has taught theatre classes and directed for NC State, UNC-Chapel Hill, PlayMakers Professional Acting Training Program.

Education: MFA in Acting from the American Repertory Theatre/Moscow Art Theatre Institute for Advanced Theatre Training at Harvard University.

Caroline Marques

#14

PlayMakers: Debut. Company member in their first year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art.

University: Exit, Pursued by a Bear; Something Rotten! the Musical; Nia; Anna K. (Kenan Theatre Company).

Film: Dream Killers (Student Film).

Education: B.A in Dramatic Arts at UNC Chapel Hill.

Celeste Pelletier

#46

PlayMakers: Debut. Company member in their first year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art.

Regional: It’s A Wonderful Life, The Burn Vote, The Wolves, The Little Prince (River & Rail Theatre); King Lear, Althea and Angela (The Word Players); A Kid Like Jake, The Thanksgiving Play (Flying Anvil Theatre).

University: Airness, Three Sisters, Top Girls (Clarence Brown Theatre).

Film: The Fool (Yenno Studio).

Katie Stevens

#13

PlayMakers: Debut.

University: 35mm (Pauper Players), Urinetown (Kenan Theatre Company), Spring Awakening (Kenan Theatre Company), Bonnie & Clyde (Company Carolina and Pauper Players).

Education/Awards/Other: BA in Dramatic Art and Communications – UNC-Chapel Hill. Diana Worrtham Y.E.S. Emerging Artist Scholar.

Mengwe Wapimewah

#00

PlayMakers: Company member in their third year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art. Little Shop of Horrors (u/s), Confederates, Death of a Salesman, The Christmas Case of Hezekiah Jones, Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Fat Ham, Much Ado About Nothing. The Lifespan of a Fact, Stupid F**king Bird (PlayMakers/DDA Ground Floor).

University: Recycling Theater (Stella Adler Studio of Acting); The Quiet Zone (Stella Adler Studio of Acting).

Film: MAGICKY (Pace University); Sisyphus (Pace University); Vices (JG Filmworks); Out of Luck (RK Productions).

Education: BFA Acting for Film, Television, Voiceovers, and Commercials at Pace School of Performing Arts.

Aubrey Snowden

Director

PlayMakers: What the Constitution Means to Me (Director), As You Like It, The Skin of Our Teeth. The Drowsy Chaperone (Co-Director and Choreographer, Summer Youth Conservatory). Antigone, References to Salvador Dalí Make Me Hot, Beast on The Moon (PlayMakers Ground Floor).

Off-Broadway/New York: Sense and Sensibility (Associate, Bedlam); Spill (Associate, Ensemble Studio Theater); Man Solo Festival (Bedlam); Phedra (Access Theatre).

Regional: Little Women (Virginia Theatre Festival); Constellations, Betrayal (The Wilbury Group); Sense and Sensibility (Associate, American Repertory Theater); SeaWife (Associate, White Heron Theater).

University: Marburg (Louisiana State University), Exit Pursued by a Bear (Kenan Theater-UNC), Urinetown, Mr. Burns: A Post Electric Play, The Wolves, The Fairytale Lives of Russian Girls (Kenan Theatre Company); Green (Manhattanville College); Machinal (Brown Trinity).

Education and Training: BA, Manhattanville College; MFA, Brown University/Trinity Rep; Tectonic Theatre Project; SITI Company; National Theater Insititute; LaMama International Director’s Symposium.

Awards:2019 Motif Magazine Award for Best Set Design; 2019 Schwab Academic Excellence Award at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Proud member of The Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

Yi-Hsuan (Ant) Ma

Scenic Designer

PlayMakers: The Royale. Ant is an international scenic and production designer; her approach to design is interdisciplinary and poetic, and she now teaches at UVA.

Off-Broadway selected credits: Cymbeline (NAATCO); Usus (Clubbed Thumb); Blood Work (National Black Theater); Smart (Ensemble Studio Theater); Bloom Bloom Pow (ART/NY).

Awards: Her theatrical installation work, Samuel at The Tank, has been nominated for a Notable Effects Show at the Hewes Design Awards. www.ant-setdesign.com

Pamela A. Bond

Costume Designer

PlayMakers: Confederates, The Christmas Case of Hezekiah Jones, The Game, Stick Fly.

Regional: The Color Purple (Raleigh Little Theatre), House of George (National Black Theatre Festival); FENCES (Arts Center of Coastal Carolina); White (Bulldog Theatre); Black Nativity (Justice Theatre Project). She also performed in Dance on Widows Row (Agape Theatre).

Education/Other: B.A. in Theatre, a B.S. in Textiles & Apparel, and an M.A. in Textiles & Apparel from North Carolina Central University. Ms. Bond is a member of Alpha Psi Omega Honor Society, Gamma Xi Phi Art Society, and Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated.

Abigail Hoke-Brady

Lighting Designer

PlayMakers: The Christmas Case of Hezekiah Jones,How I Learned What I Learned.

New York: The White Chip (MCC Theater); To the Ends of the Earth (JACK); The Strangers Came Today, Beginning Days of True Jubilation (SOCIETY Theater Co); BUST (Soho Repertory Theater); Bound (Fresh Squeezed Opera); The Little Death Vol 1 (Prototype Festival); MukhAgni (Under the Radar/The Public Theater); Silent Voices: Lovestate (New Victory Theater / Brooklyn Youth Chorus); Portrait and a Dream (Contemporaneous).

Regional: Tosca (Pittsburgh Opera); Pagliacci (Seattle Opera); Street Scene, Fanciulla del West, Pirates of Penzance, Roméo et Juilette, Otello, Kiss Me, Kate (Central City Opera); King James (The Old Globe); Rigoletto (Holy City Arts & Lyric Opera); Don Pasquale (Opera Omaha); Sir John in Love (Bard Music Festival); Cosi fan Tutte (San Diego Opera); The Last American Hammer, FLORIDA (UrbanArias); Glory Denied, Three Decembers (Tri Cities Opera); Mad Forest (Bard College/Theatre for a New Audience).

Education/Other: Drew University, BA. NYU, MFA. Member of USA 829. www.hokebradydesigns.com

Daniel Baker

Sound Designer

PlayMakers: The Royale.

Broadway: Eclipsed, Parisian Woman, Purlie Victorious (assistant), American Son (assistant).

Off Broadway: Toni Stone (Roundabout Theatre Company); The Lying Lesson, The Great Leap, The Jammer, and These Paper Bullets! (The Atlantic); The Four of Us and When We Were Young and Unafraid (MTC); Bull in a China Shop (LCT3); The Good Negro and Eclipsed (The Public); A Winter’s Tale (TFANA). Daniel has designed sound for over 150 productions at 25 regional theaters across the country. He holds an MFA in Sound Design from the Yale School of Drama and teaches at Barnard College

Tia James

Vocal Coach

PlayMakers: Company member since 2018. Actor: The Royale, Confederates, Much Ado About Nothing, Clyde’s, Hamlet, Blues for an Alabama Sky, A Wrinkle in Time, Julius Caesar, Native Son. Director: Crumbs from the Table of Joy, How I Learned What I Learned, As You Like It, Macbeth (PlayMakers Mobile), and Constellations (PlayMakers Ground Floor).PlayMakers Resident Vocal Coach.

Broadway: The Merchant of Venice.

Off-Broadway / New York: The Winter’s Tale, The Merchant of Venice (Shakespeare in the Park).

Regional: Much Ado About Nothing (Commonwealth Shakespeare Company); Richard III (Allentown Shakespeare); Loving and Loving (Stella Adler Studios); Much Ado About Nothing (Two River Theatre); Civilization [All You Can Eat] (Woolly Mammoth Theater).

Television: “Nurse Jackie,” “Treme.”

Education / Awards: MFA NYU Tisch Graduate Acting Program, BFA Virginia Commonwealth University; Miller Voice Method Teacher Certification. Recipient of the 2014 NYU Graduate Acting Diversity Mentorship Scholarship, 2003 Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Irene Ryan Acting Scholarship winner for Best Actor; 2019 Michael Chekhov/Zelda Fichandler Scholarship.

Mark Perry

Dramaturg

PlayMakers: Company member for 15 seasons.A Good Boy, Death of a Salesman, Misery, Emma, Yoga Play, Everybody, How I Learned to Drive, Jump, The Cake, De Profundis, The Crucible, Trouble in Mind, Metamorphoses, Surviving Twin, A Raisin in the Sun, An Iliad, Noises Off, The Parchman Hour, Shipwrecked! An Entertainment, The Little Prince. Mark teaches play analysis and playwriting in the Department of Dramatic Art. His plays The Will of Bernard Boynton and A New Dress for Mona have been produced in our Kenan Theatre, and both have been published by Drama Circle. He has also directed the Kenan TheatreCompany’s productions of The Cherry Orchard, Hedda Gabler, and The Seagull.

Education/Other: MFA, Playwright’s Workshop, University of Iowa. Former recipient of NC Arts Council Literature Fellowship for Playwriting.

Aspen Blake Jackson

Stage Manager

PlayMakers: Confederates, The Shot, The Christmas Case of Hezekiah Jones, Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Murder on the Orient Express, Much Ado About Nothing, Clyde’s, They Do Not Know Harlem, Native Gardens. Pippin, The Prom, The Drowsy Chaperone, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Summer Youth Conservatory).

Aspen is delighted to be returning for her fourth season with PlayMakers Repertory Company. A graduate of UNC Chapel Hill with a B.A. in Vocal Performance and Dramatic Arts.

Sarah Smiley

Assistant Stage Manager

This is Sarah’s 14th season with PlayMakers, since first joining the company in 2005. She has worked professionally for over 30 years in the entertainment and theatrical industries, in theme parks and road houses in eight states and the U.K. She is a member of Actors’ Equity Association and has been active in USITT and the Stage Managers’ Association. She received her M.F.A. from the University of Iowa.

Shelley Johnson

Assistant Director

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Directed By Nathaniel P. Claridad

November 19-December 7

As the youngest member of New York’s wackiest family, Alice Sycamore dreads bringing her fiancé and his parents home for dinner. But this eccentric crew of rocket makers, dancers, snake collectors, and accidental tax-evaders might just win their hearts—and yours! Learn more.

PlayMakers Leadership

Vivienne Benesch

Producing Artistic Director

Vivienne is in her tenth full season as a company member and Producing Artistic Director with PlayMakers, where she has helmed productions of The Game, Hamlet, The Skin of Our Teeth, The Storyteller, Dairyland, Life of Galileo, Leaving Eden, The May Queen, Three Sisters, Love Alone, RED, and In The Next Room. In her time with the company, she is particularly proud to have produced 14 world premieres and launched PlayMakers Mobile, a touring production aimed at reaching underserved audiences around the Triangle. For 12 seasons, she served as Artistic Director of the renowned Chautauqua Theater Company and Conservatory, presiding over the company’s transformation into one of the country’s best summer theatres and most competitive summer training programs. Vivienne directed both the world premiere of Noah Haidle’s Birthday Candles for Detroit Public Theatre and, in 2022, its Broadway production starring Debra Messing. She has also directed for Studio Theatre and the Folger Shakespeare Theatre in D.C. (Helen Hayes nomination for best direction), The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, Trinity Repertory Company, NY Stage & Film, and Red Bull Theatre, among others. She will direct Measure for Measure at The Old Globe in San Diego in June of 2026. As an actress, Vivienne has worked on and off-Broadway, in film and television, at many of the country’s most celebrated theatres, and received an Obie Award for her performance in Lee Blessing’s Going to St. Ives.

Vivienne is a graduate of Brown University and NYU’s Graduate Acting Program. As an educator, she has directed for and served on the faculty of some of the nation’s foremost actor training programs, including The Juilliard School, UNC-Chapel Hill’s Professional Actor Training Program, Brown/Trinity Rep MFA Program, and at her alma mater, NYU. She is a recipient of the prestigious Zelda Fichandler Award given by the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation.

Maura J. Murphy

Director of Operations

Maura is here for her tenth full season, returning after a 23-year hiatus. In that time, she honed her administrative skills at Duke, NCSU and of course, Carolina. She was production stage manager for PlayMakers from 1993-1996 and general manager from 1996-1999. Education: EdD and MS in Higher Education Administration, NCSU; BA in Drama, Muhlenberg College.

Michael Rolleri

Production Manager

Michael is in his 39^th season with PlayMakers Repertory Company. He has been Technical Director, Project Manager, Exhibition Technician, and Lighting Designer for industrial shows in the Southeast region, as well as lead carpenter for films, the U.S. Olympic Festival, and scenic studios. He has also been a rigger in the Southeast region and has served on the executive board and as President of IATSE Local 417. Michael is a 30-year Gold Pin member of IATSE. An active United States Institute For Theatre Technology (USITT) member, he is a three-time winner at USITT’s Tech Expo. He is a full Professor/Head of the Technical Production Program at UNC-Chapel Hill and was an instructor at High Point University and Tufts University. Education: MFA in Design and Technical Production, UNC-Greensboro.

Tina CoyneSmith

Director of External Relations

Tina is excited to begin her first season with PlayMakers Repertory Company! She will oversee all aspects of external affairs including revenue, marketing, communications, and audience development strategies. Tina brings with her close to three decades of external relations experience at UNC-Chapel Hill, a majority of that organizing the work of the Board of Directors for the Arts & Sciences Foundation. She has served on the development teams for the Ackland Art Museum, the Kenan Flagler Business School, the Adams School of Dentistry, and the Duke University Nasher Museum of Art. Tina looks forward to connecting with patrons, alumni, and our broader community to share a passion for theatre and to build support that will sustain PlayMakers as a vibrant hub for creativity and world-class performance. Tina earned degrees in English from Loyola University in Maryland and the College of William & Mary (with an honors thesis in 18th C. drama). She is passionate about Shakespeare, eclipses, colonial American history, musicals, musicals about colonial American history, grammar, photography, escape rooms, games, roller coasters, and air fryers! Expect an invitation to coffee to rhapsodize about all of the above as well as the treasure that is PlayMakers!

Our Mission

PlayMakers Repertory Company is North Carolina’s premier professional theatre company, proudly in residence on the dynamic campus of the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill. Our mission is to produce relevant, courageous work that tells stories from and for a multiplicity of perspectives. We believe that theatre can have a transformational impact on individuals and entire communities, and we are committed to making our work accessible to all. PlayMakers also serves as the professional laboratory for UNC-Chapel Hill’s Department of Dramatic Art, nurturing future generations of artists and audiences.

Land Acknowledgment

We acknowledge that the land on which the University of North Carolina stands is the ancestral homeland of Eastern Siouan-speaking Indigenous peoples (Yesàh, “The People”). We honor and acknowledge the citizens of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, the Coharie Indian Tribe, the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina, the Haliwa-Saponi Indian Tribe, the Sappony, the Meherrin Nation, the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation, and the Waccamaw-Siouan Tribe, who, along with citizens of other tribal nations, comprise one of the largest populations of Indigenous people east of the Mississippi River.

As we look to the future, may we build upon the memories and goodwill of all who walked and labored here before us with truth, integrity and honor. Learn more: UNC American Indian Center www.americanindiancenter.unc.edu.

PlayMakers is…

(American Theatre Magazine), PlayMakers Repertory Company is North Carolina’s premier professional theatre company, proudly in residence on the dynamic campus of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. The professional company was founded in 1976, growing out of a storied 100-year tradition of playmaking at Carolina.

“One of America’s Best Regional Theatres”

At the very heart of the PlayMakers experience is one of the nation’s last remaining resident theatre companies, made up of accomplished performers, directors, designers, artisans, and technicians, and supported by exceptional graduate students in UNC’s Department of Dramatic Art. Our company works side by side with guest artists from all over the world and our alumni include Pulitzer Prize, Tony®, Emmy®, and Grammy Award® winners.

Creating Tomorrow’s Classics, Today

Producing Artistic Director Vivienne Benesch is continuing PlayMakers’ tradition of producing vibrantly reimagined classics, large-scale musical theatre, and significant contemporary work, but is also broadening the company’s reach to become a home for new play development and a true hub of social and civic discourse in the region. Her first seven seasons have already given life to twelve important new American plays.

A Hub of Engagement

PlayMakers seeks to provoke thought, stimulate discussion, and push the boundaries of the theatrical form in everything we do. Whether through our intimate @PLAY series, our mainstage offerings or our virtual line-up, we look for opportunities for direct, dynamic engagement between audiences, artists, and thinkers. We also offer a host of unique engagement opportunities designed to enrich our audience’s experience of the live arts.

Theatre for the People

PlayMakers Mobile is an initiative that seeks to contribute positively to the civic and social life of our region by taking world-class theatre out of our building and into the community. We create a streamlined production of a play and take it to schools, transitional housing facilities, and long-term treatment facilities around the Greater Triangle area. And best of all, it’s all free of charge.

Passing the Torch

PlayMakers’ award-winning Summer Youth Conservatory is the only professionally supported training program of its kind in the region. The Theatre Quest program provides camps to area middle school and high school students, while the Theatre Intensive and TheatreTech programs allow Triangle high schoolers to apprentice directly with professional directors, choreographers, musical directors, and technicians, culminating in a professional quality production on the PlayMakers mainstage for the whole community to enjoy.

Eliminating Barriers

With a commitment to eliminating barriers for attendance, PlayMakers offers All Access performances for our patrons living with disabilities. We also offer accessible $20 tickets for all performances and ticket prices are reduced to just $10 for UNC students. For more information, please contact prcboxoffice@unc.edu.

PlayMakers’ 2024/25 Season is Made Possible in Part by Grants from

Foundation Support

Joan H. Gillings Foundation, Frey Foundation, Robertson Foundation, The Educational Foundation of America, Highland Vineyard Foundation, The Shelby Family Foundation, Rao Family Foundation, T. Rowe Price Program for Charitable Giving

Additional Funding for Guest Artists is Provided by

Jeffrey Hayden Guest Lectureship Fund, Robert Boyer and Margaret Boyer Fund, Louise Lamont Fund, Emeriti Professors Charles and Shirley Weiss Fund

Corporate Council

Craven Allen Gallery & House of Frames, Larry’s Coffee, Mediterranean Deli, Bakery, and Catering, Metal Supermarkets Raleigh, Pineapple Sol Catering, Pinsieline Properties LLC, University Florists, Vimala’s Curryblossom Cafe, Lanza’s, Top Of The Hill.

Associates

Glasshalfull

PlayMakers Repertory Company is a program of the Department of Dramatic Art, The College of Arts and Sciences, and The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Cultural Resources, recognizes PlayMakers as a professional theatre organization and provides grant assistance to this organization from funds appropriated by the North Carolina General Assembly and the National Endowment for the Arts. PlayMakers is a beneficiary of the Elizabeth Price Kenan Endowment and the Lillian Hughes Prince Endowment.

PlayMakers Repertory Company is a Member of Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national organization for the American theatre.

This Theatre operates under an agreement between the League Of Resident Theatres (LORT) and Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.

The scenic, costume, lighting and sound designers in LORT Theatres are represented by United Scenic Artists, Local USA-829 of the IATSE.

The Director and Choreographer are members of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, a national theatrical labor union.

For this Production

Shelley Johnson, Assistant Director
Laura Pates, Production Technical Director
Rachel Van Namen, Assistant Technical Director
Brandon “Bruce” Hearrell, Shop Lead
Arthur N Adcock-Vidouria, Lighting Assistant
Jessica Land, Costume Shop Manager
Francis Werth, Crafts Assistant
Kris Kingsolver, Draper
Bailey Mae Doran, Jillian Gregory, Mackenzie Privett, First Hands/Stitchers
David Bost, Nick Rodgers, Audio Engineer.

A special Thank You to Brianna Pinto of the NC Courage for her skill work with our acting company.

PlayMakers’ Resident Acting Company

Jim Bray
Jeffrey Blair Cornell
Samuel Ray Gates
Julia Gibson
Kathryn Hunter-Williams
Tia James
Gwendolyn Schwinke

Professional Actor Training Program:

Reez Bailey, Dawson Bourdreaux, Matthew Donahue, Elizabeth Dye, Delany Jackson, Jadah Johnson, Nate John Mark, Caroline Marques, Trevele Morgan, Adam Moskowitz, Celeste Pelletier, Mengwe Wapimewah

Administration

Vivienne Benesch, Producing Artistic Director

Artistic

Jeff Aguiar, Director of Engagement
Tracy Bersley, Movement Coach/Choreographer
Chelsea James, Associate Producer
Tia James, Vocal Coach
Gregory Kable, Dramaturg
Jacqueline E. Lawton, Dramaturg
Mark Perry, Dramaturg
Gwendolyn Schwinke, Vocal Coach
Adam Versényi, Dramaturg
Bridgette Bagley, Assistant to Producing Artistic Director

Management

Lisa Geeslin, Accountant
Charisse Holloway, Admin Support Specialist.
Amy Evans, General Manager
Zoë Lord, Company Manager
Maura J. Murphy, Director of Operations
Ella Hawn, Work Studies

External Relations

Tina CoyneSmith, Director of External Relations
Lenore Field, Special Events Coordinator
Anna Fletcher, Assistant Director of Annual Giving

Marketing & Audience Services

TJ Carr, Graphic Designer and Marketing Associate
Alex James, Audience Services Associate
Hannah LaMarlowe, Marketing Specialist
Ava Lytle, Audience Services Associate
Thomas Porter, Box Office Manager
Rosalie Preston, Director of Marketing & Sales
Alicia Norman, Sophie Taylor: Student House Managers
Micah Kennel: Student Box Office Manager.
Christopher Bailey, Lynlee Collins, Lindsey Kanipe, Deonna Koonce, Alex Lankford, An Thanh Nguyen, Leah Page, Kas Perez, Laura Santiago: Box Office and Front of House Work Studiesi

Department of Dramatic Art

Kathryn Hunter-Williams, Chair and Associate Professor

FACULTY

Judy Adamson, Professor Emerita
Vivienne Benesch, Professor of the Practice
Tracy Bersley, Associate Professor
Pamela Bond, Assistant Professor
James Bray, Teaching Assistant Professor
Jan Chambers, Professor
McKay Coble, Professor
Jeffrey Blair Cornell, Professor Emeritus
Ray Dooley, Professor Emeritus
Samuel Ray Gates, Associate Professor
Julia Gibson, Professor
Douglas Hall, Associate Professor
David Hammond, Professor Emeritus
Rachel Hynes, Teaching Assistant Professor
Letitia James, Assistant Professor
Gregory Kable, Teaching Professor
Jacqueline E. Lawton, Associate Professor
Matthew Mallard, Lecturer
Triffin Morris, Professor of the Practice
David Navalinsky, Professor
Bobbi Owen, Distinguished Professor Emerita
Laura Pates, Assistant Professor
Kathy Perkins, Professor Emerita
Mark Perry, Teaching Associate Professor
Rachel E. Pollock, Lecturer
Bonnie Raphael, Professor Emerita
Michael Rolleri, Professor
Gwendolyn Schwinke, Assistant Professor
Aubrey Snowden, Teaching Assistant Professor
Craig Turner, Professor Emeritus
Adam Versényi, Professor
Tao Wang, Assistant Professor

Administration

Weston Barker, Program Specialist
Lucas Branch, KTC Technical Director
Jocelyn Chatman, Costume Inventory Specialist
Lisa Geeslin, Accounting Technician
Taylor McDaniel, Student Services Manager
Karen Rolleri, Business Coordinator
Sarah Tackett, Director of Business Administration

Production

Michael Rolleri, Production Manager

Costumes

Jocelyn Chatman, Costume Shop Manager
Matthew Mallard, Assistant Costume Director
Triffin Morris, Costume Director
Janis Nordeen, Wardrobe Supervisor
Rachel Pollock, Costume Craftsperson
Jillian Gregory, Kris Kingsolver Jessica Land, Bailey Mae Doran, Mackenzie Privett, Francis Werth, Costume Production Graduate Students
Ellie Steever, First Hand/Stitcher
Katherine Craig, Theo Kendrick, Ellis Vanderburg, Costume Shop Work Studies
Saturn Brundick, Ellison Brown, Costume Shop Undergraduate Assistants
Natasha Harm, Wardrobe Assistant Work Study
Ava Kennel, Costume Stock Work Study
Maya Tilson, COSTAR Historic Costume Collection Assistant Work Study

Lighting

Benjamin Bosch, Electrics Supervisor
Nick Rodgers, Production Swing for Lighting & Sound

Props

Eden Clementine, Swing Scenic Artist/Props Artisan
Sam Gainer, Props Artisan
Lauren Reinhartsen, Properties Supervisor
Evan Wilker, Props Undergraduate Assistant
Ava Casey, Work Studies

Stage Management

Aspen Blake Jackson, Stage Manager
Sarah Smiley, Stage Manager
Kayla Jordan, Production Assistant

Sound

David Bost, Sound Supervisor
Jayden Alexander Peszko, Work Studies

Scenic

Brandon “Bruce” Hearrell, Shop Supervisor
Laura Pates, Technical Director
Rachel Van Namen, Associate Technical Director
Diane Zimmerman, Scenic Charge Artist
Benjamin Fink, Roark, Gibson Cameron, Josh Zietak, Technical Production Graduate Students

BE OUR MVP

We’re running a playbook filled with reimagined classics, bold new voices, and blockbuster favorites. At PlayMakers you’ll see champions: our acclaimed resident company brings their A Game to every performance alongside guest artists who boast Pulitzer, Tony, Emmy, and Grammy Awards.

But unlike athletes with sponsorship deals, our players don’t have big contracts. With ticket sales covering just under 40% of expenses, we rely on you to keep the magic of theatre alive in the Triangle.

When you give to the PlayMakers Fund, you support:

Our championship team—the PlayMakers resident company
Award-winning guest artists from across the globe
Sets, lighting, sound, and costumes—Broadway-quality made here
New work commissions that amplify multiple voices
K–12 student matinees and the Summer Youth Conservatory

When you support PlayMakers, you’re not just cheering from the sidelines—you’re making the winning play. Be part of the team that makes it all possible.

Be Our MVP Today!

Donate

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The above list represents patrons who have made gifts to PlayMakers between July 1, 2024 and September 17, 2025.

A heartfelt thanks to the Friends of PlayMakers whose generosity makes it possible to produce world-class theatre here in Chapel Hill. For more information about supporting PlayMakers, or to request request a correction to the listing above, please contact Tina CoyneSmith, director of external relations, at 919.962.4846 or tc@unc.edu.

Patron Spotlight

Allison and Ford Worthy

One of us recently asked the other: “What do you think our return on investment is from supporting PlayMakers?” Well, that’s impossible to calculate, but we know it’s high – very high. We’ve been PlayMakers subscribers together for nearly 30 years. (And before that, Ford first subscribed as a UNC sophomore in 1975.) The stories we’ve seen told on the PlayMakers stage have entertained us, moved us, provoked and unsettled us, inspired us, thrilled us, and sometimes frustrated us. Some performances have stayed with us long after we’ve left the Paul Green Theatre for the night. There was a powerful drama from 10 years ago – Disgraced, about faith and prejudice and identify – that we’ll never forget. There was last season’s joyful musical about the blood-sucking Venus flytrap that we laugh out loud about every time we glimpse the especially scary, monster-like tree right outside our house. Best of all, when we take our seats in the PlayMakers audience, we get to share the experience with other members of our community. Watching a PlayMakers production just wouldn’t be the same without watching it with the rest of you. That’s another reason we value PlayMakers – and why we’re so committed to supporting it.

Table of Contents

PlayMakers Advisory Council

About the Author

Program Notes

The Wolves

by Sarah DeLappe

Directed by Aubrey Snowden

October 8 – 26, 2025

Actor Bios

Swetha Anand

#2

Elizabeth Dye

#7

Delaney Jackson

#11

Jadah Johnson

#8

Lily Kays

#25

Dana Marks

Soccer Mom

Caroline Marques

#14

Celeste Pelletier

#46

Katie Stevens

#13

Mengwe Wapimewah

#00

Aubrey Snowden

Director

Yi-Hsuan (Ant) Ma

Scenic Designer

Pamela A. Bond

Costume Designer

Abigail Hoke-Brady

Lighting Designer

Daniel Baker

Sound Designer

Tia James

Vocal Coach

Mark Perry

Dramaturg

Aspen Blake Jackson

Stage Manager

Sarah Smiley

Assistant Stage Manager

Shelley Johnson

Assistant Director

UP NEXT

By Moss Hart & George S. Kaufman

Directed By Nathaniel P. Claridad

November 19-December 7

PlayMakers Leadership

Vivienne Benesch

Producing Artistic Director

Maura J. Murphy

Director of Operations

Michael Rolleri

Production Manager

Tina CoyneSmith

Director of External Relations

Our Mission

Land Acknowledgment

PlayMakers is…

Creating Tomorrow’s Classics, Today

A Hub of Engagement

Theatre for the People

Passing the Torch

Eliminating Barriers

PlayMakers’ 2024/25 Season is Made Possible in Part by Grants from

Foundation Support

Additional Funding for Guest Artists is Provided by

Corporate Council

Associates

For this Production

PlayMakers’ Resident Acting Company

Professional Actor Training Program:

Administration

Artistic