By The Way, Meet Vera Stark

VC

Uarts Department of Theatre and Dance is excited to present two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage’s By the Way, Meet Vera Stark, which takes audiences behind the glamour of Hollywood’s Golden Age for a clever, captivating and often hilarious look at fame, ambition and the stories history chooses to tell.

Vera Stark has the talent, ambition and charisma to light up the silver screen. There’s just one problem: in 1930s Hollywood, the industry has already decided which roles a Black woman is allowed to play.

Vera is a sharp-witted, determined aspiring actress working as a maid to Gloria Mitchell, a white movie star desperately trying to hold on to her place in the spotlight. When both women land roles in the same major motion picture, their lives and careers become intertwined in unexpected ways. What begins as a chance at stardom unfolds into a story spanning seven decades, revealing how one woman’s career can be celebrated, misunderstood and reinterpreted over time.

Blending the fast-paced humor of classic Hollywood comedies with surprising twists and thought-provoking insights, By the Way, Meet Vera Stark explores the complicated intersections of race, friendship, opportunity and success. Beneath its sparkling comedy lies a compelling question: Who gets to tell our stories, and what happens when the world remembers them differently?

Entertaining, poignant and remarkably relevant, this imaginative play offers audiences plenty to laugh about—and even more to think about long after the curtain falls.