The Bunner Sisters reading in New York on April 3, 2024
A reading of The Bunner Sisters, adapted by Richard Alleman and directed by Anthony Newfield, will be presented April 3, 2024, at 6:30 p.m., at the historic House of the Redeemer, 7 East 95th Street, New York. Tickets: $25 at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-bunner-sisters-tickets-817375671637
Based on the little-known Edith Wharton novella, The Bunner Sisters is a far cry from Wharton’s better-known upper-class Gilded Age territory. Adapted by journalist/playwright Richard Alleman, The Bunner Sisters tracks the lives of two spinster sisters eking out a living as seamstresses in a tenement basement in Lower Manhattan in the 1880s. When an unattached man enters the picture, the sisters’ complacent existence is upended. Sensitively brought to the stage by Alleman, The Bunner Sisters takes audiences on a dramatic journey to a not-so-innocent age, with many of the same problems we face today, including income inequality, the precarious status of women, even addiction.
Alleman completed his adaptation of the novella in 2015, at which time he and director Anthony Newfield co-produced a staged reading in San Francisco with the Re:ACT theater company. This was followed in 2016 by a fully mounted production in San Francisco that played to sold-out houses. Returning to New York, Alleman and Newfield continued to fine-tune the play, with more workshops and readings, including a very successful production at Wharton’s landmark Massachusetts home, The Mount. Back in New York, in the spring of 2020, an Off-Broadway production was being prepared. Unfortunately this production had to be cancelled due to COVID.
In the midst of the pandemic, however, a surprising development: The Bunner Sisters was translated into Italian by University of Pisa professor and Wharton aficionado Simone Pratelli. This Italian version was presented last September by San Francisco’s Museo Italo Americano. Now, the House of the Redeemer’s I Fabbristi is pleased to present this reading of the play…in English.
The cast includes Anne (Les Misérables) Buelteman, Katie (A Day by the Sea) Firth, Erin (Fellow Travelers) Neufer, Josiah (Mad Men) Polhemus, Amy (The Heiress) Prosser, and Jo (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel) Yang.
The Edith Wharton Society 