Lab:Stripped
LAByrinth Theater Company returns to 59E59 Theaters with its annual LAB: STRIPPED, staged works in progress. More than a reading, but not quite a production, STRIPPED keeps the focus on the script with minimal technical elements and actors holding scripts. Now in its 3rd Season, LAB: STRIPPED will open with the play Blanca & Ines by Cusi Cram and will be presented in partnership with The Sol Project.
Blanca & Ines
February 10 - February 14, 2026
59E59 Theaters, NYC
The Locus
February 24 - February 28, 2026
59E59 Theaters, NYC
Blanca & Ines
By Cusi Cram
Directed by Estefanía Fadul
With Silvia Dionicio & Ani Mesa-Perez
Two young Latinas lock eyes at a Greenwich Village party in 1954—and the world tilts. Blanca is a razor-sharp bartender who’s weary of struggling to be a painter and is looking for a ring and a powerful man. Ines is a Cuban seamstress with an open heart and big artistic dreams. What begins as flirtation becomes a doomed duet—mentorship, rivalry, and seduction ensue—all played out in Greenwich Village in the cold water flats and ateliers where post war American art is being invented.
Blanca & Ines is an unsentimental love story about women who want everything- and the cost of ambition in a world that fears women’s talents and desires. It asks how art gets made, who is allowed to make it, and what women sacrifice to be seen.
Cusi Cram is a playwright, screenwriter, director, performer, educator, and advocate for underrepresented writers in the arts. Her plays have been produced by Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, LAByrinth Theater Company, Primary Stages, the Denver Center, South Coast Repertory’s Hispanic Playwrights Project, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Atlantic Theater Company, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Cornerstone Theater Company, and New Georges. Her work has been supported by the O’Neill Theater Center, the Sloan Foundation, the Bogliasco and Camargo Foundations, the Ford Foundation, MacDowell, Space on Ryder Farm, The Church, and the Venturous and Stillpoint Funds. She spent many years writing for WGBH’s Arthur, earning three Emmy nominations, and directed her first feature film, Wild & Precious, through AFI’s Directing Workshop for Women, where it received the Adrienne Shelly and Nancy Malone Awards. Most recently, she directed a dystopian feminist sci-fi short film in the deep woods of the Catskills produced by the Moonshot Initiative. She has taught at Fordham University, Columbia University, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and NYU Florence, and is currently Associate Chair of the Dramatic Writing Program at Tisch School of the Arts. She is on the board of the Leah Ryan Fund and is a proud member of LAByrinth Theater Company.
Estefanía Fadul is a Brooklyn-based Colombian-American director, and co-Artistic Director of Ensemble Studio Theatre. Recent projects A Bodega Princess Remembers by Iraisa Ann Reilly at EST, the world premieres of Eva Luna by Caridad Svich (Repertorio Español), The Garbologists by Lindsay Joelle (Philadelphia Theater Company), Carla’s Quince created with The Voting Project (Drama League Award nomination), Zoom Intervention by Noelle Viñas (Weston Playhouse, NYTimes Critics Pick), The Same Day by Stefan Ivanov (Sfumato Theatre, Bulgaria), and C. Quintana’s Azul (Southern Rep) and Scissoring (INTAR). Estefanía has developed new work off-Broadway and regionally at the Public Theater, Playwrights’ Realm, NYTW, Chautauqua, Audible, Goodspeed, Juilliard, and more. She is the inaugural recipient of New York Stage and Film’s Pfaelzer Award, and an alumna of directing fellowships at Clubbed Thumb, the Drama League, O’Neill/NNPN, Williamstown, and Repertorio Español. She serves on the Drama League’s Board of Directors, and is a member of the Leadership Circle of the Center for Performance and Civic Practice, the Latinx Theatre Commons advisory committee, the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, and SDC.
Silvia Dionicio is a classically trained Afro-Latina actress from the Dominican Republic whose work spans stage, television, and film. In 2023, she led Queen of Basel at TheaterWorks and recurred on NBC’s Chicago P.D. (Season 10). Most recently, she starred in the critically acclaimed HBO series Task, portraying Mark Ruffalo’s foster daughter.
Ani Mesa-Perez is a New York based Cuban American actor who was recently seen on Broadway in the award winning production of Oedipus playing the role of Lichas and understudying Antigone. She can currently be seen starring in the Sundance award winning film Superior, streaming on the Criterion Channel, HBO MAX (EU), and Mubi (USA). Continuing her relationship with the production team of Superior, Ani recently wrapped Destroy All Girls ,her first feature film as both writer and actor. Ani is a graduate of The Lee Strasberg Institute and Stella Adler Conservatory at NYU Tisch.
The Locus
By Lucy Thurber
Directed by Jenna Worsham
With Ngozi Anyanwu & Alison Pill
Two old friends meet once a year. Always the same motel, in the same quaint town. Always the same sweet memories and joyful traditions. Tina and Sarah are closer than sisters, and it's always good to catch up. Or so it seems.
What happens when the language you have no longer keeps the truth at bay and the ghosts away? A play about the stories we tell in order to bear the ones we can't.
Lucy Thurber is a TV/Film Writer and OBIE Award-winning Playwright. She has written for networks and streaming services including HBO, Amazon, AMC, Hulu, USA and Starz, among others. Lucy is the author of sixteen plays: Where We’re Born, Ashville, Scarcity, Killers and Other Family, Stay, Bottom of The World, Monstrosity, Dillingham City, The Locus, Perry Street, The Insurgents, Recover, Orpheus in the Berkshires, Transfers, Some Revolutionaries and Port Isabel, TX. Lucy has been commissioned by Steppenwolf Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Yale Repertory, A.C.T., Williamstown Theatre Festival and CATF, among others. Lucy's thirteen Off-Broadway productions have received various nominations over the years, including Drama Desk, Lucille Lortel and Drama League Award nominations. She is the recipient of Manhattan Theatre Club’s Playwriting Fellowship, the Gary Bonasorte Memorial Prize, a Helen Merrill Award, a LILLY Award and an OBIE Award for her five-play cycle, The Hill Town Plays. Produced by such theaters as The Atlantic, MCC Theatre, Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre and Williamstown, Lucy is also a proud alumni of New Dramatists, 13P, Sundance, New Harmony Project, Berkeley Rep's Ground Floor, The Orchard Project, and a member of Labyrinth Theater Company. Lucy is represented by George Lane at CAA, as well as Dan Halsted & Corinne Hayoun at Manage-ment. She is currently a professor of TV/Film for The Gallatin School at NYU, and has taught writing for Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence College, Northwestern University and MCC Theatre's Youth Company.
Jenna Worsham is a New York-based stage director, writer, dramaturg and creative advocate. Directing credits include: The Visitors by Bryna Turner (Second Stage, upcoming 2026); Lagniappe by C.A. Johnson (New York Stage & Film); Arrowhead by Catya McMullen (IAMA Theater); At The Wedding by Bryna Turner for Lincoln Center (NYT Critic’s Pick, LCT3); Superstitions by Emily Zemba (The Pool Plays); The Siblings Play by Ren Dara Santiago (Rattlestick); Summer’s Soldier by Boo Killebrew & The First Immigrant by Martyna Majok (Williamstown); Belleville by Amy Herzog (Pasadena Playhouse);The Climb by C.A. Johnson (Cherry Lane); Agnes by Catya McMullen (59E59, NYT Critic’s Pick); Street Children by Pia Scala-Zankel (NYT Critic’s Pick, Vertigo Theater); Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (Pride Plays). Jenna is the author of four plays: Game, The Fifth, Lacuna and The Southerner. The Fifth was nominated for the Venturous Fellowship by Martyna Majok and selected for the Relentless Award’s 2025 Summer Series (directed by Lila Neugebauer). Game was developed in residence at SPACE on Ryder Farm. Jenna is the co-founder of New Roots, a residency program for LGBTQIA+2s artists at Walhalla Farm in upstate New York, and the co-creator of The Homebound Project in partnership with No Kid Hungry. Jenna has been awarded a National Directing Fellowship (Eugene O'Neill Center), a Drama League Fellowship, a Boris Sagal Fellowship (Williamstown), and a Jonathan Alper Award (Manhattan Theatre Club). As an Associate Director on Broadway, credits include: William Inge’s Picnic; Beau Willimon's The Parisian Womanstarring Uma Thurman; and Wendy Wasserstein's Tony-nominated revival of The Heidi Chronicles starring Elizabeth Moss (directed by Pam MacKinnon). Jenna has developed new plays at institutions such as ACT, The Public, Yale Rep, Steppenwolf, the O’Neill (NPC), Second Stage, MTC, Women’s Project, NYSAF, Labyrinth, New Dramatists, MCC, The Lark, New Georges, Primary Stages, among many others. A proud member of SDC, Jenna is represented by Emma Feiwel at WME.
Ngozi Anyanwu is a multi-hyphenated storyteller, and most recently a 2020 Steinberg Playwright Award winner. Anyanwu’s recent play Monsters, was recently produced at Two Rivers Theater ahead of a NY run of the play at MTC. Anyanwu’s play Leroy and Lucy premiered at The Steppenwolf Theatre, in fall of 2024. Previous productions include Last of the Love Letters (Atlantic Theater Company), Good Grief (Vineyard Theatre in NYC / Center Theatre Group in LA) in which she also starred, and The Homecoming Queen (sold-out world premiere run at the Atlantic Theater). Good Grief was on the Kilroys List 2016 and a semi-finalist for the Princess Grace Award, and won the Humanitas Award. The Homecoming Queen was on the Kilroys List in 2017 and was a Leah Ryan Finalist. Her play Nike… (Kilroys List 2017) was workshopped at The New Black Fest in conjunction with The Lark and The Strand Festival in conjunction with A.C.T and Space on Ryder Farm. Ngozi also has been commissioned by NYU, The Old Globe, Two River Theater, The Atlantic Theater, and Steppenwolf. Anyanwu has also received residencies from LCT3, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Space on Ryder Farm, the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, The New Harmony Project, New York Stage and Film, and Page 73. She attended Point Park University (BA) and received her MFA in Acting from the University of California, San Diego.
Alison Pill will next be seen starring in the miniseries Unspeakable: The Murder of JonBenét Ramsey. Pill recently starred in the feature film Young Werther, which had its world premiere at TIFF 2024, and starred in Uncle Vanya on Broadway, directed by Lila Neugebauer. Alison also had a major role in M. Night Shyamalan’s Trap. Pill recently did a reading of Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman, directed by Lila Neugebauer, as part of the Main Stage Reading Series for Williamstown Theatre Festival's 2023 season. Alison also recently starred in the independent feature Eric Larue directed by Michael Shannon.