Plays written by Julia Jarcho
COZINESS
PITY WHORE
MARIE IT’S TIME
PATHETIC
THE TERRIFYING
EVERY ANGEL IS BRUTAL
NOMADS
GRIMLY HANDSOME
DREAMLESS LAND
Synopses
Coziness – In a “small but vibrant” New England city, a group of hardworking private school moms try to keep it together while the world falls apart. Are their kids really forging a new world order based on human sacrifice? Is it too early for a margarita?
Pity Whore – A contemporary adaptation of the Jacobean revenge drama ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore, Pity Whore reimagines the classic story of a brother and sister in love, clinging to the brutality and tenderness of the original while injecting a heavy dose of sick humor. This won’t end well for anyone.
Marie it’s Time – A f*cked-up mixtape about love, motherhood, and violence, this fresh stab at Woyzeck collides song and text, pumping hot blood through the veins of theater’s favorite murder-victim. A three-person play with songs staged as a rock show, originally featuring Jennifer Seastone and Julia Jarcho as versions of the doomed Marie, and Kedian Keohan as Major, the backbeat and object of lust.
Pathetic – Teen girls experiment with sex, magic and murder while mom sinks deep into lust and self-loathing. A teen-drama riff on Racine’s Phèdre, PATHETIC invites you to get off on the sick horrors of becoming a woman.
The Terrifying – In a creepy little village on the cusp of modernity, kids and their families are stalked by a ravening monster. How do you live with forces that want to destroy you? Maybe by cultivating some dark appetites of your own…
Every Angel is Beautiful – In this high-action revenge thriller, a trio of American college girls are recruited to work as spies in Berlin—but as time goes on and lusts intensify, it gets harder to tell the good and bad guys apart… not to mention the birds.
Nomad – Set in somebody’s fantasy of the 1940s and inspired by the work of the midcentury American author Jane Bowles, NOMADS follows the intertwining adventures of two tormented women as they pursue their unnamable passions through jungle and metropolis.
Grimly Handsome – A pair of sinister Christmas tree salesmen have come to wreak havoc on our fair city. A pair of detectives are bent on catching the killer. A young woman finds herself drawn into their cat-and-mouse games and transformed in ways she could never have imagined. Well, maybe she could’ve. Meanwhile, wild animals have been sighted in the vacant lot across the street. Are they dogs? Raccoons? Or something more ferocious?
Dreamless Land – Haley’s best friend Morton is about to go meet his estranged father in Las Vegas. As Haley imagines Morton’s experience, she pieces together her own version of her friend’s “broken home.” Ten years later, Haley seems to be living a grown-up life, but the fantasies of her teen years slowly start interrupting reality again.
Bio
Julia Jarcho is a playwright, theater artist, and scholar. Plays she has put on with the NYC company Minor Theater include Marie It’s Time (2022), Pathetic (2019), The Terrifying (2017), Nomads (2014), and Grimly Handsome (2013), which won an OBIE for Best New American Play, and was also produced at the Royal Court Theatre in London (2017). Other productions include Every Angel Is Brutal (Clubbed Thumb, 2016) and Dreamless Land (New York City Players, 2011). Awards: Doris Duke Impact Award, Mark O’Donnell Award, HARP Residency (with Minor Theater), shortlisted for 2025 Bruntwood Prize. Her book Throw Yourself Away: Writing and Masochism came out in 2024 from the University of Chicago Press.Other books: Minor Theater: Three Plays (53rd State Press) and Writing and the Modern Stage: Theater beyond Drama (Cambridge University Press). She is the head of MFA playwriting at Brown.