Wish You Were Here

A SAMUEL FRENCH, INC. TITLE

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Concord Theatricals

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Cast Size

5w
Duration

105 Minutes
Target Audience

Adult

Accolades

Recipient, 2021 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award

Details

Summary

It’s 1978 and protests are breaking out all across Iran, encroaching on this suburb where a tight-knit circle of girlfriends plans weddings, trades dirty jokes, and tries to hang onto a sense of normalcy. But as the revolution escalates, each woman is forced to join the wave of emigration or face an equally uncertain future at home. With breathtaking humanity and cutting wit, Wish You Were Here chronicles a decade of life during war, as best friends forever become friends long lost, scattered and searching for home.

History

Wish You Were Here made its world premiere on July 1, 2020 at Williamstown Theatre Festival in Williamstown, Massachusetts. The play premiered off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons on April 13, 2022. Directed by Gaye Taylor Upchurch, the off-Broadway production featured Nikki Massoud, Marjan Neshat, Nazanin Nour, Artemis Pebdani and Roxanna Hope Radja.

Cast Attributes

All Women

Keywords

Performing Groups

All womxn. All start around age 20 in 1978. Cast them as the women they will become.

NAZANIN – Sort of mean.
SALME – Peaceful; religious and hijabi. Even when she’s not paying attention, she is present.
ZARI – Happy-go-lucky, spacecase. Grows up a lot.
SHIDEH – Uptight, takes everything too seriously. But takes it much easier later in the play.
RANA – Queen of cool, sophisticated and fun.
NEW FRIEND – Played by Shideh.

Time Period 1990s, 1980s, 1970s
Setting Various living rooms in Karaj, Iran. 1978 to 1991.
Features Contemporary Costumes / Street Clothes
Additional Features No intermission
Duration 105 Minutes

Media

"A masterful work... How lucky we are to live in a time when Sanaz Toossi is actively writing.” – Theatrely

"Toossi focuses... on the women and how their relationships to one another – and to themselves – change with marriages, deaths and sudden departures. Their friendship is its own saga of constantly fluctuating degrees of intimacy and friction.” – The New York Times

“Bittersweet... It’s Toossi’s intention to lend an ear to women when secluded, but she decidedly has a deeper concern. On her mind is the fragility of friendship, when it flowers and wilts, sometimes flowering again, sometimes never returning, or barely returning.” – New York Stage Review

“Femininity and the fallouts of war are given an appealingly informal treatment in Wish You Were Here... Charting the course of a tight-knit friend group as the Iranian Revolution shakes up its members’ lives one intimate conversation at a time, it feels like a night in with the girls while the world outside crumbles and changes.” – Theatrely

Videos

Wish You Were Here: Meet the Cast (Audible)

Photos

Image: 2022 Playwrights Horizons Production (Joan Marcus)

Image: 2022 Playwrights Horizons Production (Joan Marcus)

Licensing & Materials

Minimum Fee: £55 per performance plus VAT when applicable.

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Ticketing

Authors

Sanaz Toossi

Sanaz Toossi is an Iranian-American playwright from Orange County, California. Her plays include the critically acclaimed, Pulitzer Prize-winning English (co-production, Atlantic Theater Company/Roundabout Theatre Company) and Wish You Were Here (Playwrights Horizons; William ...

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Wish You Were Here