{"id":20184325,"date":"2025-09-24T01:30:00","date_gmt":"2025-09-24T08:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.metrosiliconvalley.com\/?p=20184325"},"modified":"2025-09-23T23:04:43","modified_gmt":"2025-09-24T06:04:43","slug":"playwright-lauren-gunderson-theatreworks-silicon-valley-little-woman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metrosiliconvalley.com\/playwright-lauren-gunderson-theatreworks-silicon-valley-little-woman\/","title":{"rendered":"Lauren Gunderson Talks About \u2018Little Women\u2019 Adaptation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Since its publication more than 150 years ago, Little Women<\/em> has been adapted into plays, musicals, operas, ballets, silent movies, feature films, TV series and Japanese anime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the most referenced literary works in pop culture, it was even name checked on an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm<\/em>, whose star\u2014neurotic curmudgeon Larry David\u2014described the March sisters \u201cmawkish and twee.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Playwright Lauren Gunderson adds her own spin on the classic Civil War-era story in Louisa May Alcott\u2019s Little Women<\/em>, running at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley Sept. 24 through Oct. 12. In Gunderson\u2019s adaptation, directed by Giovanna Sardelli, Alcott is inserted into the play to show how much of her life directly influenced the book and its themes of family, feminism and resilience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have always loved the book,\u201d Gunderson says. \u201cI was in middle school when I played Jo March in our production, and it meant so much to me back then. I really wanted to do something special with it. So instead of just being the story of the March sisters, it\u2019s also the origin of those beloved characters and Louisa discovering the reason to write them, and stepping into the story through herself and putting her sisters into it. We get to know both the Alcott and the March families.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2018Alcott admits that so much of the book is drawn from her life and her sisters,\u2019 playwright Lauren Gunderson says. \u2018So it was really easy to see them in each other.\u2019 PHOTO: Contributed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Gunderson, who lives in San Francisco, has created several plays inspired by famous historical women, namely supreme court justices, French revolutionaries, tennis player Billie Jean King, author Lorraine Hansberry, astronomer Henrietta Levitt and the first woman in congress, Jeannette Rankin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

TheatreWorks recently staged part of her trilogy Christmas at Pemberley<\/em>, based on Jane Austen\u2019s Pride and Prejudice<\/em> and co-authored by Margot Melcon. The theater, along with City Theatre Company (Pittsburgh), Northlight Theatre (Skokie, Ill.) and People\u2019s Light (Malvern, Pa.), co-commissioned Gunderson to come up with a \u201cfresh take\u201d on Little Women<\/em> \u201cthat is still really true to the book.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really a rare model for developing plays,\u201d Gunderson says. \u201cAll of the theaters were looking for a similar thing. But because of the cuts in arts funding and precariousness of our arts sector, none of the theaters could really do this commission on their own, so they all came together. It was a wonderful, fruitful collaboration. And I love all these theaters independently. It was a chance to meet all of them and talk about what each of them is looking for. I just absorbed all of that and filtered it through my own artistic lens.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gunderson began writing the play in 2023 and the following year presented a reading of the script at Alcott\u2019s Orchard House and museum in Concord, Mass., where Little Women<\/em> takes place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In her interpretation, Alcott\u2019s real-life mother and sisters interact with the fictional Marmee, Meg, Beth, Amy and Jo (the middle March sister and aspiring writer, who also plays the author). The characters speak Gunderson\u2019s dialogue as well as some of the original language from the book, which was published in two parts in 1868 and 1869. The male characters\u2014Laurie, John, Friedrich and the sisters\u2019 father\u2014are also represented. Gunderson\u2019s modern take highlights the parallels between the novel and Alcott\u2019s biography, but it also retains the story of a close-knit family struggling with war, poverty, independence and gender roles in 19th-century society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAlcott admits that so much of the book is drawn from her life and her sisters,\u201d Gunderson says. \u201cSo it was really easy to see them in each other. By working that into the script we could mix it up. They don\u2019t just stay in their lane. There\u2019s a lot of Meg in Jo, and there\u2019s a lot of Jo in Marmee. Beth isn\u2019t just weak and Meg isn\u2019t just domestic and sweet. Meg has some of Amy\u2019s pluckishness and humor in her. They\u2019re one unit as a family, but they build upon each other\u2019s characteristics.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After debuting last year at the Northlight Theatre, the production has been commissioned by other theaters beyond the end of its initial run in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI hope the audience sees this as an American classic and a classic that is as universal as American classics written for men and boys,\u201d Gunderson says. \u201cLittle Women<\/em> is not a polite, tidy, easy and sweet story, but something that\u2019s raucous, deeply intellectual and romantic. It\u2019s all the things that I want from a great work of literature. And I want audiences to be reminded that women can be brave, brazen, creative, ambitious and, yes, absolutely head over heels in love. And they deserve a big, full-throttled love story.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The TheatreWorks Silicon Valley production of Louisa May Alcott\u2019s Little Women runs Sept 24\u2013Oct 12 at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro St., Mountain View. Tickets are $39-$109. theatreworks.org<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018Little Women\u2019 has been adapted into plays, musicals, operas, ballets, movies, TV series and Japanese anime. Now a playwright adds her spin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14789,"featured_media":20184329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"categories":[7979],"tags":[20552,20551,12037],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n