As ever, Hudes's writing is poetic but wry, full of swagger and poetry.
There's live music, but oh, how the lines sing too. -- David Cote, Time
Out New York
Ms. Hudes draws all her characters with precision and understanding...
this warm-blooded play underscores how the disorienting flux of life can
be navigated with the help of carefully tended family ties. -- Charles
Isherwood, New York Times
Delightful... Hudes is a very accomplished storyteller, a playwright
with an emergent, fulsome American narrative. -- Chris Jones, Chicago
Tribune
"Hudes has a keen ear for dialogue and a gift for characterization."
-Scotty Zacher, Chicago Theater Beat
At the dawn of the Arab Spring in an ancient Jordinian town, an Iraq War
veteran struggles to overcome the traumas of combat by taking on an
entirely new and unexpected career: an action-film hero. At the same
time, halfway around the world in a cozy North Philadelphia kitchen, his
cousin takes on a heroic new role of her own: as the heart and soul of
her crumbling community, providing hot meals and an open door for the
needy.
The final installment in Hudes's three-play cycle, which began with the
Pulitzer Prize-finalist Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue and Pulitzer
Prize-winner Water By the Spoonful, The Happiest Song Plays Last is
about the search for redemption, humility and one's place in the world.
Quiara Alegría Hudes is the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning
Water by the Spoonful, the Tony Award-winning musical In the Heights
and the Pulitzer Prize finalist Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue. Her other
works include Barrio Grrrl!, a children's musical; 26 Miles;
Yemaya's Belly and The Happiest Song Plays Last, the third piece in
her acclaimed trilogy. Hudes is on the board of Philadelphia Young
Playwrights, which produced her first play in the tenth grade. She now
lives in New York with her husband and children.
