Yale Drama Series: 'KARA & EMMA & BARBARA & MIRANDA' (reading)

Selected by Yale Drama Series judge and Pulitzer Prize-winner Branden Jacobs-Jenkins.

Playwright Ariel Stess is the winner of the 2025 Yale Drama Series Prize for her compelling and thought-provoking play KARA & EMMA & BARBARA & MIRANDA. Chosen from nearly 2,000 entries across 55 countries, and celebrated for its raw and powerful exploration of women's inner lives, connection, and agency.

Jacobs-Jenkins commented, "Stess’s work stood out for the line-by-line sparkle and polish of its composition and the playwright’s cool confidence in the power of well-crafted language alone to transport an audience to and through the vast inner wilds of character…This is dramatic portraiture of the highest order.” 

This reading features an acclaimed cast including Kristen Sieh (House of Cards, Orange Is the New Black), Mike Iveson (What the Constitution Means to Me), and Connie Shulman (Orange Is the New Black), to name just a few.

The reading will be immediately followed by a post-show conversation with Stess and Jacobs-Jenkins moderated by Long Wharf Theatre Artistic Director Jacob G. Padrón.