HOW TO GET TO HEAVEN FROM THE CRAWFISH POND World Premiere

Playwright, director, and poet Melanie Maria Goodreaux returns to her longtime creative home, Theater for the New City (TNC), with the world premiere of How to Get to Heaven from the Crawfish Pond, a darkly comic Louisiana love story about death, desire, family, faith, and the possibility of redemption. The production runs November 5th – 22nd, 2026 at Theater for the New City.

The production marks a milestone for Goodreaux: 2026 is her 25th year of writing and directing plays. How to Get to Heaven from the Crawfish Pond follows her recent TNC productions, including The Popes of Farragut Street, The White Blacks, and Rita Is the Goat. The new production arrives as Goodreaux's work receives fresh recognition. Hollie Harper and Benjamin Rowe, actors in her 2025 Theater for the New City production The Popes of Farragut Street, have received 2026 AUDELCO Award nominations. Harper is nominated for Featured Actress in a Play for her performance as Rachel Patsy, while Rowe is nominated for Lead Actor in a Play for her performance as Conrad Patsy.

The nominations bring the number of AUDELCO nominations connected to Goodreaux's Theater for the New City productions to four. Her 2024 play Rita Is the Goat also received AUDELCO recognition, with its cast nominated for Outstanding Ensemble Performance in 2025.

Set in Louisiana and infused with Goodreaux's blend of magical realism, surreal comedy, spirituality, and poetry, How to get to heaven from the crawfish pond asks what we owe the people we love before, and perhaps even after, death. Crawfish farmer Earl Roussel has been dead for ten years when he suddenly wakes up in a 'Purgatory' that happens to be his front yard. He longs for his beloved wife, Ruth, who is on her deathbed but escapes at night to see him so they can make love. Meanwhile, their estranged sons and daughter are at odds over money 'stolen' from the family, and a pair of nuns, who may be more con artists than women of God. As Earl and Ruth refuse to let something as inconvenient as mortality separate them, their children must confront old wounds, family secrets, and the question of whether reconciliation is still possible when time is running out.

The new play continues Goodreaux's exploration of New Orleans and Louisiana culture, Black life, spirituality, family, and the complicated ways people search for love and redemption.

Event Details

November 5th – 8th, 12th – 15th, 19th – 22nd, 2026

Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 8:00 PM

Sundays at 3:00 PM

Tickets: $25

Senior and Student Discounts: $15

Pay What You Can Sundays

Tickets and further information are available at Theater for the New City's ticketing site.

Written by Melanie Maria Goodreaux. Directed by Melanie Maria Goodreaux with Christopher Bello.

Cast

Arlene A. McGruder, Alan Walls, Jasmyn Unique Tilford, Javán Robinson, Riyadh Rollins, Tabitha Bradley, and Mary-Linda Greene.

Creative Team

Set & Props: Lytza Colon, Gregory Paul

Lighting Design: Alex Bartenieff

Sound Design: Luke Santy, Boston Fielder/Urb Alt, Anthony Harper, Christopher Bello

Visuals/Projections: Anthony Harper/Christopher Bello

Casting: Mary-Linda Greene

Costumes: Billy Little

Graphics: Diane Sullivan, Christopher Bello

Producers: Mark Holloway, David Kahl, Anthony Harper, Bruce Morrow, Norah Lawlor

About the Playwright and Director

Melanie Maria Goodreaux is an award-winning playwright, director, and poet whose work spans theater, poetry, and performance. Her plays have been featured at Chelsea Playhouse, the House of Tribes Theater, the Abingdon Theater, Studio Players Theater, the Linhart Theater, the Lillian Theater in Los Angeles, the Nuyorican Poets Café, HOWL! Festival, the New York Theater Festival, the Hudson Guild Theater, Theater for the New City, and The Foundry. Goodreaux received the American Woman Project Solo-Play Development and Production Award (2020–2021) for Dramatic Question. Her play, Rita is a Goat, was nominated for an AUDELCO award. A fixture of New York's downtown theater scene, she has taught creative writing and drama at Urban Arts Partnership, Creative Theatrics, and Theater for a New Audience.

About Theater for the New City

Since its founding in the 1970s, Crystal Field and Theater for the New City (TNC) have championed emerging playwrights for the American stage—regardless of race, sexuality, economic status, or gender. The Emerging and Presenting Playwrights Program supports artists as they forge their paths in the arts. Over the years, hundreds of playwrights—including Suzan-Lori Parks, María Irene Fornés, Harvey Fierstein, Bina Sharif, Charles Busch, Andrea Fulton, Eduardo Machado, and William Electric Black—have found their home at TNC.

Photo Credit: Melanie Maria Goodreaux

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