Boston Playwrights' Theatre to Present CHOSEN CHILD, 10/30-11/22

Boston Playwrights' Theatre (BPT) continues its 2014-15 season with Chosen Child by Monica Bauer. Running from October 30 to November 22, this new drama will be directed by Megan Schy Gleeson.

The play begins at New York City's Port Authority Bus Terminal and leaps across space and time to tell the story of a family-most particularly a brother and sister now lost to each other. David suffers from schizophrenia, but he hopes to reconnect with his family after his mother's death. It turns out his sister may be right around the corner or half-way across the country. Either way, she doesn't want to be found.

According to Bauer, the story of Chosen Child has roots close to home.

"For years friends had been urging me to write a memoir because of my strange and unusual 'origin story,'" she says. "I was told I was adopted, but found out I had never been legally adopted, and in fact I don't legally exist. While trying to write a memoir, this play just started to tumble out of me and assert itself. Part true story and part fiction, it's sort of my Glass Menagerie memory play. It's about the need for forgiveness-and the power of forgiveness, for those who have been lost, and for those who are desperate to be found."

A graduate of Boston University's Playwriting Program, Bauer's award-winning plays have been seen off-Broadway (My Occasion of Sin, Lighter) and beyond (Detroit Repertory Theatre, Edinburgh Festival Fringe). Bauer performed her autobiographical solo show The Year I Was Gifted at the Whitney Arts Center in Pittsfield, Mass., last summer.

Chosen Child will be directed by Megan Schy Gleeson, who helmed Peter M. Floyd's Absence last year. Schy Gleeson is a director and teacher at Concord Academy, a private high school in Concord, Mass. Prior to moving to Boston, she worked as an actor, both regionally and in New York City.