FEBRUARY 2027
KRISTINA WONG #FOOD BANK INFLUENCER
Written & Performed By Kristina Wong
Directed By Jessica Hanna
Pulitzer Prize finalist Kristina Wong brings her signature irreverence to the American musical—this time, through the lens of our nation’s emergency food system.
Based on her experiences with food distribution from New York to the Navajo Nation, Wong offers biting, hilarious commentary on food insecurity and America’s obsession with giving (and receiving) free food. How will she make you laugh about hunger? It’s a SNAP! (That’s the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.) Plus, free supplemental groceries available after every show! “The seeds of this show started in my neighborhood of Koreatown Los Angeles where I discovered World Harvest Food Bank on Arlington and Venice right before the pandemic. World Harvest became part of the ecosystem for our Auntie Sewing Squad pandemic era mutual aid work. I was so fascinated with this place that I started to research our emergency food systems everywhere and that became this sexy new musical. I’m thrilled to finally bring it home to Los Angeles!”
Jaclyn Backhaus is a playwright, screenwriter, and educator hailing from Phoenix, Arizona. Her Off-Broadway plays include Out Of Time, Wives, India Pale Ale, Men On Boats, and You On The Moors Now. She has developed theater, film, and TV work with 1497 Features Lab, Sundance, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Berkeley Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Manhattan Theater Club, Ars Nova, The Public Theater, and Two River Theater. She is currently a New Dramatists resident playwright, a core member of The Kilroys, and co-founder/creative director of Fresh Ground Pepper, an artistic process lab in NYC. Wives had its world premiere Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons in September 2019.
Arpita Mukherjee is a NYC based director and writer who recently made her Broadway debut as the resident director of The Kite Runner. Arpita previously directed Bollywood Kitchen by Sri Rao (Geffen Playhouse), House of Joy by Madhuri Shekar (San Diego Rep), and Eh Dah: Questions for my Father by Aya Aziz (Next Door @ New York Theatre Workshop). Arpita is the Co-Book Writer of Monsoon Wedding, The Musical, which recently had its NYC premiere at St. Ann’s Warehouse. Arpita has developed work at the Public Theater, WP Theater and O’Neill Theater Center, amongst others. She is a 2021 Resident Director at the Drama League, a 2018 - 2020 Women’s Project Lab Member and a 2018 Eugene O’ Neill National Directing Fellows and an alumni of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab. Arpita directed Running, a film written by and starring Danny Pudi and co-wrote the screenplay for the Disney+ Hotstar film Gulmohar with director Rahul Chittella. Arpita is currently developing projects for WIIP, AMC, and a Netflix feature directed by Mira Nair, with music by Pharrell Williams. Arpita is the Co-founder and Artistic Director of Hypokrit.
Praise for KRISTINA WONG #FOOD BANK INFLUENCER
Winking and exuberant! Jaclyn Backhaus’ WIVES is a swift and playful feminist manifesto.
— Sara Holdren, New York Magazine“WIVES is a gleeful work of historical subversion.”
— Ben Brantley, New York Times“[…]The full ride of the play is more than worth it, fast and furious, imaginatively plummeting the depths of history and our human experience that will leave you feeling uplifted…”
— David Walters, New York Theatre GuideRead our COVID-19 Policy
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