Twilight Bowl: A Play That is Equally Exciting for its Audience and Actors

Written by Zhiyun Zhao I've been working on a play called Twilight Bowl this semester, which ran from April 11-28th at UW-Madison's Hemsley Theatre. Written by Rebecca Gilman, the play is about the three gatherings of six college-aged girls at a bowling alley bar in Reynolds, an imaginary town in Wisconsin, and focuses on the choices that these girls need to make when they are facing adulthood.Friendship, family, class, education, religion, and substance abuse are just some of the major themes in Twilight Bowl, and Rebecca Gilman did a fantastic job in weaving these themes into her play. The audience will see how class and family background affect these girls' educational opportunities and religious beliefs, and how their experiences ruin life-long friendships and help form new relationships. However, because of the incorporation of controversial topics like higher education, abortion, and opioid crisis, some lines in this play might make audience members feel uncomfortable, but they will also push the audience to reflect on themselves.Twilight Bowl is not only a thought-provoking show for the audience to see, but also a great opportunity for college-aged actresses to share their stories. The play is commissioned by the Big Ten Theatre Consortium, which promotes "new plays by and about women." Rebecca Gilman fulfilled this goal by creating six strong female characters who have their own distinguishable personalities. What's even better is that some characters' personalities change over time, and others show the different sides of their personalities as the story unfolds. Therefore, as one of the actors of this play, I'm very excited to play a round character, and I think it will be equally exciting for the audience to see the lives and choices of six young women, whose stories need to be told on stage.