Well – A Riotously Funny Play – Now Playing

Daina Michelle Griffith & Virginia Wall Gruenert -
Photo by Heather Mull
From the moment you walk into the theater, you might sense that this play is going to be different. What you won’t sense prior to the start, is just how funny this play will be.

Well is not your typical play where the actors stay in character the entire time. Well is a production where the actors portray their characters, have an awareness of audience, and play themselves…the actors.

Well is a play about a mother who heals a neighborhood through racial integration, but who is not able to heal herself.  It is also about the impact the mother’s illness has on this mother-daughter relationship as the daughter struggles to understand why her mother cannot get well.

Virginia Wall Gruenert, artistic director of Off The Wall Productions, and who plays the mother in the play, selected the play.  When asked why this play, Ginny commented that this play is funny and it’s hard to find good comedy.  She also noted that the way the play is written is unique. “The play is not just people talking on the set.  It gets crazy and wild and the actors talk to the audience.”  She also pointed out that besides being funny, the play delivers great messages pertaining to mother-daughter relationships and our notions of wellness and illness.

December 13-28. Pittsburgh Theater Live
Well, written by Lisa Kron, is a riotously funny play that acknowledges the heartbreaking challenge of true empathy.  Appropriate for ages 16+.  Click here for tickets and information.  Tickets on sale now.


 About Virginia Wall Gruenert (Ann) was last seen playing Juliana in The Other Place, Off The Wall’s first production in their new Carnegie venue.  A graduate of Syracuse University, she studied acting, voice, and movement in New York, London, and in L.A. with the legendary Stella Adler.  Favorite roles include Martha in Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Dr. Livingston in Agnes of God, Thelma in ‘night, Mother (Off The Wall), various roles in her original play Shaken & Stirred (Off The Wall and Theater 54 in NYC), Aunt Meme in Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Wanda in Kennedy’s Children (Syracuse Stage).  Her short play Bugaboo was produced at Swan Day Pittsburgh 2012, and her full-length play Without Ruth was produced here at OTW in May 2013.  Virginia is a proud member of The League of Professional Theater Women, The Dramatists Guild of America and Actors’ Equity Association.  She serves as Artistic Director of Off The Wall Theater.

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