Review: ‘Fefu and Her Friends’

Performed in the Minor Latham Playhouse and various rooms in Milbank Hall, “Fefu and Her Friends” delivered a raw performance on issues of feminism, mental illness, and patriarchy that still speak true today.

Photo provided by Maria Baranova

By Aya Yamauchi

March 25, 2026

“Fefu and Her Friends,” written by Maria Irene Fornes in 1977 and produced by the Barnard Theatre Department, ran from March 7 to 9 in the Minor Latham Playhouse. It featured a diverse cast and was supported by a generous crew. The three-act play followed Fefu — an upperclass white woman living with her husband in New England during the 1930s — and her friends as they prepared a fundraiser together at Fefu’s home. It explored the internal struggles of women who face patriarchal violence and the societal pressure to maintain femininity and domesticity. 

Act one set the stage of a dreamy day in the 1930s countryside through its nostalgic set design. The stage, designed by Professor Sandra Goldmark, felt like a time capsule of early 20th-century New England. Stylistic coherency in the use of antique lamps, instruments, fashionable furniture, and a backdrop of warm red and yellow colors constructed the authentic lives of upper-class women: classy, elegant, and genteel. 

The character of Fefu, played by Mimi Wu (BC ’26), especially set a lively tone with her commanding presence and wit. Portrayed in a charismatic, charming, and perhaps overly confident way, Wu interacted enthusiastically with her guests. Similarly, Fefu’s friends, Emma and Paula, played by Bess Blackburn (BC ’27) and Bella Williams (BC ’26), respectively, brought an enthusiasm that radiated throughout the theater — laughter was heard from the audience as the women pulled clever jokes on one another. In a way, the actors’ snappy dialogue and cheerful attitude convincingly masked their true emotions from the audience. 

In Act two, the illusion of the women’s positivity and love for one another, invoked by the warm lighting and their charisma, was shattered — literally, as the audience was asked to physically leave the theater, a specific directional choice established in Fornes’ script. The audience was broken up into smaller groups to watch four scenes unfold in four different locations in Milbank Hall.

Fornes did not specify details of each scene’s setting; instead, each production had the power to choose where to place its actors. Under the staging of director Alice Reagan, the audience went on a journey of rooms throughout Milbank Hall, including the Arthur Ross Greenhouse, the Krueger Lecture Hall, the Ella Weed Room, and Milbank 328. Each choice of room was made with clear care and intentionality, successfully supporting the specific narratives of each scene. 

In the Arthur Ross Greenhouse, for example, Fefu and Emma had an intimate and heated talk about Fefu’s dreams, which showed her frustrations toward womanhood. Yet, as Fefu tried to be vulnerable, the audience was unable to see her in full, due to the plants overcrowding the space. The monotonous sound of water used to irrigate the plants echoed throughout the greenhouse and competed with Fefu’s monologue. Despite the symbolism of the greenhouse as a space where things grew and prosper, it inevitably acted against Fefu and prevented her from being truly seen. As part of the resolution, Blackburn sang Fred Astaire’s “Cheek to Cheek.” The greenhouse, although not fit to provide perfect acoustics like the Minor Latham Playhouse, nevertheless amplified the bittersweet tone in Blackburn’s voice. The greenhouse brought out the irony of Blackburn’s performance of the song — Astaire sang because he felt he was in heaven dancing with the love of his life, but Blackburn’s rendition was filled with sorrow.

In contrast to the greenhouse’s luscious and abundant greenery, Milbank 328 was bare and littered with junk, food scraps, and used bottles. While the space and the actors were mutually shaping the experience in the greenhouse, Shea Rodriguez’s (CC ’26) portrayal of Julia was extraordinary. All of the characters poignantly expressed their trauma and frustrations as women having to live in the shadows of men, but Rodriguez’s monologue was exceptional. She spoke rapid-fire about being tormented by imaginary male “judges” of her femininity and sexuality. Listening to Julia recall how the judges tortured her was already heart-wrenching, but the way Rodriguez’s voice trembled as she retold her story, coupled with the way she used direct eye contact with the audience, amplified the intensity of the scene. The clothes she wore and the bed she lay on made it look like a scene from an asylum, perhaps shedding light on the history of medicalizing women with delusions as victims of hysteria.

Each scene created intimacy between the audience and the characters. Unlike in a theater, where there is a clear divide between actor and audience, having the audience stand in the same room as the actors made the characters’ struggles become even more real. There were goosebumps when Cindy (Zoë Chang, BC ’25) screamed in the Krueger Lecture Hall as she recalled her terrifying dream with an Italian singer, and there was sorrow in Christina’s (Emerson Antunes Black, BC ’28) eyes as she tried to soothe Cindy. Audiences felt the air tighten as Cecilia (Isa Lilja-Vasquez, CC ’28) and Paula, through solemn conversation, navigated their longing for the past and their desperation to move on. The actors delivered performances greater in emotional intensity than Act one, knowing that the audience was in the same space as them. 

In Act three, the set by Professor Goldmark, lighting by Lucrecia Briceño, and sound design by Jane Shaw worked to unravel the psychological traumas of Fefu and her friends. The shift in mood was evident in scenes such as their playful water fight under warm lighting, contrasted with the darker lighting that addressed Julia and Cindy’s vulnerable conversation about mental illness. As tensions rose between characters, eerie sound effects were introduced, particularly with scenes where Fefu and Julia became increasingly frustrated with each other. Tensions peaked when the impossible happened: Fefu stood up, despite having a disability that paralyzed her legs. Suddenly, the theater shifted to a sickly yellow and then dark blue lighting. Intense lighting and music helped raise the heat of the room. The set design and production choices contributed to contrasting the idyllic impressions of the women in Act one, with its underbelly in Act three how women interact with each other when they are cracked under the pressure of patriarchy.

The Saturday matinee performance was followed by a conversation and Q&A session between Fornes scholar Gwendolyn Alker and director Alice Reagan, in which the two discussed how the play communicated the thematic change between its three acts through the set. Reagan wanted to have the space feel more expanded in Act three than Act one because of the new insight into each character’s backstory revealed in Act two. The space reflected the audience’s expanded understanding of the characters as individuals who do not solely fit into stereotypes of feminine and docile wives but women who have complex and confused relationships with their role as wives. These spatial hints were so subtle one would not have noticed without careful attention. For example, Reagan mentioned how they turned the piano around and made some changes in the placement of decorations on the walls. Alker praised the ingenuity of choosing to show change between the acts delicately, as something that no other adaptation had done before. 

Finally, one of the cornerstones of this play was its clever use of Milbank Hall. As Reagan told the audience, there was a deliberate choice to perform a story of women struggling to resolve systemic problems in a place where campus protests took place in front of administrative offices such as of the Dean and the President. Students, with a similar purpose to resolve systemic issues regarding the College administration, parallel Fefu and her friends, who were wrestling with systemic gender roles. It is also the case that Barnard originated from Milbank, as the oldest building on campus. Hence, the play also served to “look at it [Milbank] from a new perspective.” 

At the end of the talkback, Reagan explained that a play is distinguishable from its original production by how it is connected to the present. In this sense, the decision to have the audience navigate Milbank was a powerful move. By showing how Fefu and her friends grappled with their womanhood during the 1930s, in the same space where students from the 2020s grappled with their identity as Barnard students amid the Israel-Palestine conflict, the play communicated to present students and the campus community that they are not alone in their struggles. 

Reagan wrote in her statement: “We will enliven every floor of Milbank, invite the whole community (including our neighbors) into these spaces and wake up everyone’s senses to the smells, colors, and textures of women’s education.” I believe this play embraced Reagan’s vision to its fullest, providing a beacon of hope to members of our community who have lost a sense of belonging on campus.