Playbill | Director’s Note

In 2019, Actor’s Theatre of Charlotte and Children’s Theatre of Charlotte commissioned playwright Steven Dietz to create a set of plays that could be told alone but were designed to work in tandem. They called it the Second Story Project and they wanted to explore how stories are shared across generations. Dietz explores the family as Mystery stating that it is “a construct of choice and chance, held together by the narrative it tells itself.”

The adults upstairs in The Great Beyond seek the truth of their history and the forgiveness of those lost while the children in The Ghost of Splinter Cove begin an adventure that explores their own fears and reunites those in stories left untold.

The patterns of these stories – the narratives we tell as children, as partners, as parents – are carried through each in ways that are both curious and comforting. You may find echoes of your own story in these productions.

Thank you for sharing them with us.