ANTIGONE IN ANALYSIS Premieres at La MaMa, A Feminist Reinterpretation of Greek Myth

OBIE and NYIT Award-winning Peculiar Works Project returns to La MaMa ETC's Downstairs Theatre for the world premiere of Antigone in Analysis, written by Barbara Barclay and directed by Ralph Lewis, running March 20 - April 5, 2026.

Opening night is March 23. The legendary theater presenter commemorates this spring's Women's History Month with Sophocles' classic... reimagined as a feminist fever dream of Greek storytelling caught in a philosophical nightmare!

Leading the cast as Jocasta is Bianca Leigh, just off her originating role in Broadway's Oh, Mary! and newcomer Alessandra Lopez as Antigone. The Chorus of antagonistic philosophers features Mick Hilgers (Hegel/Sentry), Nomi Tichman (Irigaray/Tiresias), Simon Henriques (Kierkegaard/Ismene), Sammy Rivas (Lacan/Haemon), and Linnea Scott (Butler/Artemis). Live music by Joseph Lynch (Flute) and Freja Højland Høj (Vocalist).

This contemporary makeover of Antigone reimagines the classical Greek myth with a metaphysical twist: a salon of great thinkers from across time conjures Sophocles' play, putting Jocasta on the throne to square off with Antigone. Their meddling erupts in a mother-daughter throwdown that interrogates patriarchal storytelling through a feminist lens. And there is no battle more fiercely fought than that between a daughter and her mother.

Playwright Barbara Barclay says, "I wanted to explore my relationship with my mother-especially her blindness to who I was. I thought about blindness in Greek tragedies, and Antigone caught my eye. Do daughters have the right to unconditional love from their mothers?"

The embattled mother-daughter relationship in Barclay's script reveals new motivations for Antigone's defiance of Jocasta's law and exposes how patriarchal rule fuels their fight. As conflicts escalate in the chorus, egos get crushed and mayhem ensues with a surprising resolution in this new play written for mothers, daughters, and everyone who's ever had one.

The play is created by Alana Asha Amram (Composer), Rachel Cohen (Choreography), Evan Frank (Sets/Projections), Grace Martin (Costumes), David Castaneda (Lighting), Madison Meyer & Gurkan Yigit (Properties) and Harrison Adams (Sound).

La MaMa's Downstairs Theatre is located at 66 East 4th Street in New York City. Performances are Thursdays - Saturdays at 8pm and Sundays at 4pm. Special opening night performance on Monday, March 23 at 8pm. Run time is approximately 75 minutes. Tickets are $35 (adults), $30 (students and seniors), and $30 for previews (March 20-22). Opening night tickets are $60 (March 23). First ten tickets to every performance are $10, limit 2 per person. Ticket prices inclusive of all fees. For more info and to purchase tickets visit https://www.lamama.org/antigone-in-analysis.

MEET THE MAKERS

Peculiar Works Project (Producer) is Ralph Lewis, Catherine Porter, and Barry Rowell, site-based performance producers who create, develop, and present original multi-disciplinary experiences in local, grassroots neighborhoods. Founded in 1993, their award-winning company encourages collaboration, experimentation, and a rebel spirit by providing artists with the tools and opportunities needed for creative exploration. They perform in unconventional spaces because they believe artistic work wakes up a site, the site transforms the work, and audiences experience both in surprising new ways-city streets, landmarked buildings, gutted storefronts, and other peculiar sites throughout NYC. Acclaimed works include Language Games, a play shot on video during COVID that has received multiple film festival awards; Manna-Hata, an epic NYC history through vacant floors of the Farley Post Office; and the OBIE Award-winning OFFStage, in which 200+ artists toured audiences to sites of original Off-Off Broadway venues in The Village. Learn more at https://www.peculiarworks.org.

Barbara Barclay (Playwright) is a multi-disciplinary artist living in SoHo, NYC, since 1973, working as a painter, sculptor, and photographer before taking up playwriting. Following two decades of dramaturgical work with Peculiar Works Project, her first play, Language Games, was selected by NYC's Rogue Theater Festival (2020). A film version was screened in AD ABSURDUM: The Politics and Poetics of Absurdity and in the 2020 Edinburgh Fringe. Acknowledgements include Women Empowerment Award and Women Awareness Award (Rome Women Festival), Best Short Script (4th Dimension Independent Film Festival), Best Women Empowerment Film (New Wave Short Film Festival), and Best Women Short (Rotterdam Indie Film Festival), along with awards from N.Y. International Women Festival, L.A. Independent Women Film Awards, Berlin International Art Film Festival, and Madrid Arthouse Film Festival. Her short plays Intuitive Leap and Animal Magnetism followed, creating The Hare Trilogy, and others include Quick Release, Blindspot, and Manny and the Celtic Hare. Antigone in Analysis received a 2025 Puffin Foundation grant and a NYSCA Individual Artist grant.

Ralph Lewis (Director) is a producer, director, writer, and actor who creates multi-disciplinary performances as a co-director of Peculiar Works Project. Post-Pandemic: Antigone in Analysis (La MaMa @ Great Jones); The Great Climate Change (Howl! Happening); In Memoriam: Astor Place Riots (Under St. Marks); The Hare Trilogy (Wild Project, Frankel Theater); Good Jew (Museum of Jewish Heritage); Birth of Broadway (BroadwayCon, NY Adventure Club); and Railroad Christmas (Episcopal Actors' Guild). Pandemic work includes: Smile Like A Knife (Ego Actus Theatre); Astor Place Riots (NY Adventure Club); and 3 short films: Language Games (Edinburgh Festival Fringe online), Intuitive Leap (Irondale's On Women Festival), and Animal Magnetism (Anthology Film Archives). Pre-Pandemic: Afterparty (222 Bowery); Two Jane Jacobs (Cherry Lane Theater); Planet X (Black Mountain College, NC); 3 Robert Heide Plays (Howl! Happening); 2 Climate Change Theater Actions (Artichoke Arts); and America's first play, Androboros (Fraunces Tavern Museum; Overthrow Boxing Ring), among others. When not devising performances, Ralph lives in a 200-year-old Federal-style house on the Bowery and volunteers with the Bowery Alliance, NYC Loft Tenants, and his local community board. AEA, SAG/AFTRA, NYU-TSOA, LCT Directors Lab, and Trinity/La MaMa master teacher.

ABOUT LA MAMA

La Mama Experimental Theatre Club is dedicated to the artist and all aspects of the theatre. La MaMa's 64th Season, LA MAMA NOW, focuses on creating solidarity and building community, exploring ways to build connections for cross-sector coalition and invite artists, activists, organizers and community members into the creative process.

La MaMa has been honored with 30+ Obie Awards, dozens of Drama Desk, Bessie Awards, Villager Awards, the 2018 Regional Theatre Tony Award, and most recently a 2023 New York Drama Critics' Circle Special Citation. They are a creative home to artists and resident companies from around the world, many of whom have made lasting contributions to the arts, including Blue Man Group, Bette Midler, Ping Chong, Jackie Curtis, Robert De Niro, André De Shields, Adrienne Kennedy, Cole Escola, Bridget Everett, Harvey Fierstein, Diane Lane, Charles Ludlam, Tom Eyen, Spiderwoman Theater, Tadeusz Kantor, Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, Meredith Monk, David and Amy Sedaris, Stephanie Hsu, Julie Taymor, Kazuo Ohno, Tom O'Horgan, Andrei Serban, Liz Swados, and Andy Warhol. La MaMa's vision of nurturing new artists and new work from all nations, cultures, races and identities remains as strong today as it was when Ellen Stewart first opened the doors in 1961.

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