A Responsible Adult - Gillespie's Bloodworks

It takes a village.

As a freelance tutor, babysitter, etc, most of the advice I receive - and the codes I tend to live by - involve distancing myself from children and teenagers who I become incredibly close with.  Who share their secrets and tantrums and fears and hopes.  Some problems are simply too hard to fix.  It's not my job to fix them, it's none of my business to tell a family how to be; my observations are often unwelcome and my advice most certainly is.  For the most part, that is fine.  Sometimes it just kills me.

Living 3,000 miles away from home means I think a lot about the families we create from community.  The friends, coworkers, classmates and clients who become emergency contacts, who dish dinner out for you into tupperware as you dash off to another appointment, who invite you to their Bar Mitzvah and Christmas Dinners, or find you a place to stay when the shit hits the fan.  In the 3 years I have lived in New York, I have experienced incredible loneliness and unimaginable kindness.  A big city full of anonymous, professional strangers; it is also a village.

A Responsible Adult is a play about a village.

(It's also a very new play.  Like, shh, this new play has been crying all day and I just got it to sleep.  Come, please come, but be kind.)

Here are the details:

A RESPONSIBLE ADULT
by Lucy Gillespie
Directed by Colleen Sullivan

Featuring Clare Barron, Parker Leventer, Chris Thorn, Nitya Vidyasagar, Helen Coxe

EST / Youngblood - BLOODWORKS 2012 Reading Series

Monday June 4th, 7pm
549 West 52nd Street, 2nd Floor
(between 10th & 11th Aves)

15-year-old Anya spends her days dragging a cello and a parakeet back and forth between her warring parents' apartments; her nights she spends practicing.  Caught skipping school and falling behind, Anya's exasperated mother hires a tutor for a quick fix.  But newly-wed Kylie, distracted by her own quarter-life crisis, may not be the best role model.  When Kylie and Anya both become involved with the same older man, all three must learn from each other how to be a responsible adult.

- LEG