SYNOPSIS:
New York City, 1999. Three generations of a loving and radically leftist family gather to celebrate the law school graduation of its youngest torchbearer, Emma. But news of a forthcoming book with shocking revelations about late Grandpa Joe - a famously blacklisted Marxist - casts a pall on the party and throws the family into an inter-generational tailspin. Shaken to the core, Emma must reconcile her fierce politics and family loyalty to decide if the end ever justifies the means. Heads butt and relationships fracture in this insightful, moving and often-humorous family portrait from rising American playwright Amy Herzog (4000 Miles, Belleville).
"A shrewd, ironic meditation on what we do with history, how we appropriate it for our own psychological needs. Among the play's many pleasures...is the way the characters struggle through their differences to listen to one another. The ability to listen is, perhaps the definition of love." The New Yorker
Performance Run Time:
ACT 1: 1 hour 10 minutes
Intermission
ACT 2 : 45 Minutes
 Playwright Amy Herzog (left)
Balancing the Political and the Personal
"I had no idea my upbringing was anomalous. In my household, Walt Disney was a villain, Fidel was misunderstood, and the Boy Scouts was a paramilitary organization."
from "Playwright's Perspective: Amy Herzog" for Playwrights Horizons
Read Herzog's essay
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