{"id":302052,"date":"2026-10-08T02:38:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T02:38:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/302052\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T02:38:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T02:38:15","slug":"two-philly-plays-explore-parenting-and-friendship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/302052\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Philly plays explore parenting and friendship"},"content":{"rendered":"

Love Philly? So do we. Let\u2019s be friends. Sign up for the Billy Penn newsletter today<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There comes a time in life when it\u2019s all about the poop.<\/p>\n

Not the metaphorical poop describing the state of the world or preceded by \u201cbull,\u201d \u2013 again describing much of what\u2019s being said about the state of the world.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re talking about actual poop \u2013 the poop in diapers, and the stuff of friendship.<\/p>\n

Two plays in Philadelphia theaters center on that \u201cprecious\u201d time when adults with young children, dog-tired and frantic, form in-the-trenches friendships that sometimes last a lifetime and sometimes don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cSummer, 1976,\u201d<\/a> from Lantern Theater Co.,<\/a> \u201cis a beautiful two-hander,\u201d said actor Grace Gonglewski.<\/a> She plays one of the two women friends in the play by David Auburn,<\/a> winner of the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for \u201cProof.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"McKenna Kerrigan stars as Diana and Grace Gonglewski as Alice in Lantern Theater Company\u2019s production of \u201cSummer, 1976\u201d through Oct. 11, 2026. (Photo by Mark Garvin)<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a story about women having a friendship that\u2019s transformational when they are young and having children, and how changes in their own lives push them apart and push them in different directions. It\u2019s poignant,\u201d Gonglewski said. The show runs through Oct. 11.<\/p>\n

\u201cBig Babies\u201d actor Jeffrey Barg,<\/a> who plays one of the parents in \u201cBig Babies,\u201d had a poop incident with his 3-year-old on the very morning of his Billy Penn interview.<\/p>\n

\"\"Jeffrey Barg is Troy Sutton, Vanessa Torres is Peg, and Chelsea Cylinder is Janus Hendricks in Pier Players Theatre Company\u2019s Big Babies (Photo by Julianne Kastner)<\/p>\n

Presented by Pier Players Theatre Co.<\/a>, \u201cBig Babies\u201d<\/a> is about a few couples, longtime friends, and all of them with young kids who have their first post-baby adults-only dinner party. The play, written by Kate Brennan<\/a> and David Lee White,<\/a> runs through Oct. 11.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody is overtired and everybody is at their wits end. It doesn\u2019t go very well,\u201d Barg said. \u201cStructurally, it\u2019s a farce. That makes them do and act in ridiculous ways, how adults, when pushed to the edge, end up acting like big babies themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

For both Gonglewski and Barg, their plays resonate deeply in their own lives.<\/p>\n

In \u201cSummer, 1976,\u201d Gonglewski\u2019s character meets a new friend through a babysitting co-op, just like Mt. Airy\/Chestnut Hill Babysitting Co-op that Gonglewski joined years ago, when her child was young. (By the way, Lantern offered ticket discounts to former and current babysitting co-op members).<\/p>\n

\"\"Grace Gonglewski is featured as Alice in Lantern Theater Company\u2019s Philadelphia production of \u201cSummer, 1976\u201d onstage now through Oct. 11, 2026. (Photo by Mark Garvin)<\/p>\n

Gonglewski is dedicating her work in the show to her longtime friend, Martha Davis, who lived half a block away in Mount Airy. Before babies, they had a neighbors\u2019 nodding relationship. But, shortly after Davis\u2019 child was born, Gonglewski dropped off a chocolate-cherry loaf. The next day she found a return gift \u2013 a pesto dish and two beers, one for each of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was it,\u201d Gonglewski marveled. \u201cShe was in for life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Their children were two months apart and they fed and bathed their children together nearly every day. \u201cIf she was the good cop, I was the bad cop. If I was the bad cop, she was the good cop,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Those early friendships are important, Gonglewski said. \u201cIt\u2019s such a boring and laborious time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there is somebody who was transformational in your life, even for a short time, consider the possibility of reaching out and this goes for men,\u201d as well, she said. \u201cThere are people in our lives who change us forever. If there\u2019s an opportunity to be connected, take it. Life is too short.\u201d<\/p>\n

Davis and Gonglewski\u2019s friendship lasted, but the fate of the friendship between Gonglewski\u2019s character, Alice, and Diana, played by McKenna Kerrigan<\/a> in \u201cSummer, 1976\u201d is nebulous. It\u2019s a memory play, so the action shifts between 1976 and 2003.<\/p>\n

The action in \u201cBig Babies\u201d sticks with just one evening and one dinner party.<\/p>\n

\"\"It was supposed to be a normal, sophisticated adult evening. Pier Players presents Big Babies. This farcical comedy runs through Oct. 11. (Photo by Julianne Kastner) <\/p>\n

Barg\u2019s character, Tyler, and his wife, Janus, played by Chelsea Chandler, decide to throw a dinner party because Janus, who has a PhD, is desperate for adult conversation having spent the last year watching Dino Train (the PBS show, \u201cDinosaur Train,\u201d) every single day.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s so desperate that, along with the menu, she even prepares a list of possible adult conversation topics: \u201cthe life and times of J.R. Oppenheimer, Munchausen syndrome by proxy, serial killers of the 1970s, serial killers of the 1980s,\u201d Barg said.<\/p>\n

Being a farce, \u201cBig Babies\u201d should incorporate the requisite slip-enabling banana peel, but Barg, as Tyler, does his best without one, tripping again and again on a loose floorboard.<\/p>\n

Escape is what the audience will experience in this show, Barg said, \u201cas they navigate the absurdities of parenting young children and all the things people thought they\u2019d never say or do until they become parents.\u201d<\/p>\n

That morning, for example, his 3-year-old panicked momentarily when his bedroom door was stuck for all of two seconds. He ran, inconsolable, to his father. \u201cHe comes and sits in my lap, needing love, and he has a massive poop in his diaper.\u201d<\/p>\n

Or, the earlier time, when his other child, now 6 and well past those years, was disturbingly quiet in another room. It turned out that he had smeared poop all over the walls.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cleaned it up and it\u2019s fine. He doesn\u2019t do that anymore. He\u2019s in first grade now,\u201d Barg said. \u201cIn some ways, the poop is easier to clean up than paint. Before I had kids, I don\u2019t know that I would have ever said that poop is preferable to other kinds of things that can be put on walls.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou are at your wits end,\u201d Barg said. \u201cYou question how much longer you can go on like this when a day feels like a week, and an hour feels like a day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Relationships with friends and partners help, but babyhood absurdity remains.<\/p>\n

Yet, \u201cyou do all of this because there\u2019s this (child) you love more than you thought you ever could love anything,\u201d he said. \u201cThose two things live side by side in the script just like they do in your own life.\u201d<\/p>\n

FYI<\/p>\n

\u201cSummer, 1976,\u201d<\/a> Lantern Theater Company,<\/a> now through Oct. 11, St. Stephen\u2019s Theater, 923 Ludlow St., Phila. 215-829-0395.<\/p>\n

\u201cBig Babies,\u201d<\/a> Pier Players Theatre Company<\/a>, Through Oct. 11, Arden Theatre Company\u2019s Hamilton Family Arts Center \u2013 Bob & Selma Studio Theatre, 62 N. 2nd St., Philadelphia, 215-922-1122.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Love Philly? So do we. Let\u2019s be friends. Sign up for the Billy Penn newsletter today. There comes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302053,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[4877,4131,69,71,70,1483],"class_list":["post-302052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-arts","tag-parenting","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-theater"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302052\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}