Whitney Review Launch Tonight

ᴀʟɪꜱꜱᴀ ʙᴇɴɴᴇᴛᴛ, ᴄʀɪꜱᴛɪɴᴇ ʙʀᴀᴄʜᴇ, ᴏʀʟᴀɴᴅᴏ ᴇꜱᴛʀᴀᴅᴀ, ꜱᴛᴇᴠᴇɴ ᴘʜɪʟʟɪᴘꜱ-ʜᴏʀꜱᴛ, ʜᴏʟᴇ ᴘʟᴀʏ ʙʏ ᴍᴀʏᴀ ᴍᴀʀᴛɪɴᴇᴢ

Please join us to celebrate the launch of issue 002 of The Whitney Review of New Writing at Sara’s (2 East Broadway floor 3). Doors will be at 7pm and performances will start at 8pm. First, readings by Alissa Bennett, Cristine Brache, Orlando Estrada, and Steven Phillips-Horst; then Maya Martinez’s Hole Play. With special thanks to LALO spirits.

Also here’s Alana Johnson’s review of Hole Play, one of the many reviews featured in issue 002 (copies available tonight).

MAYA MARTINEZ, HOLE PLAY Wonder Press, 2023: 25 pages

In Martinez’s one-act play, we’re plopped into a seedy strip mall parking lot in central Florida. Alligators lurk in nearby trenches and snakes slither in the grass next to the Payless. Our unnamed protagonist (“Girl”) emerges from Party City in furry raver boots and discovers a gaping sinkhole threatening to swallow up her car. We’re privy only to her side of an increasingly frantic phone call to her best friend, who reacts with seeming disbelief to Girl’s predicament. Girl continues to loudly spiral, ranting about the absurdity of life in the era of in-your-face climate change until she has a full-blown existential crisis. It’s easy to picture a bubbly but slightly demented Smiley Face-era Anna Faris type in the role. Annie Hamilton could probably nail it, actually. But Martinez ultimately wrote the role to play themself, debuting the show in New York this summer. The apocalypse may well be here, but at least in Hole Play it’s hilarious.