Conn (at right) and crèche in The Body of Mary: A Play in Three Acts (of God).
Women’s reproductive freedom, the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy, and abandoned infants are among sundry topics viewed through a comedic lens, for the most part, in The Body of Mary: A Play in Three Acts (of God). Premiering Tuesday at the Gym at Judson, writer-director Katie Cappiello’s trio of works share feminist concerns about religion but is composed and performed in contrasting styles.
“Act I: The Virgin” is set in Nazareth, in the years 6 to 4 B.C., and centers upon a naïve, unwittingly pregnant Mary — a recent assault by a Roman soldier is mentioned — whose anxious mom and dad strive to convince her the coming kid is a miracle. Whether the parents hope to elude unwed mother-type shame in the neighborhood or want to establish a new religion is unclear; perhaps both. A friend shows up disguised not so convincingly as the angel Gabriel to proclaim this wondrous news to the skeptical teenager.
“Act II: The Mother” transpires five years from today in the Manhattan offices of Cardinal Patrick O’Malley, an aggressive bro-style anchdiocesan executive in his 40s. Summoned to meet him is kindly Mother Mary Joseph, the genteel leader of The Immaculate Little Sisters of Self-Sacrifice and Martyrdom. She soon learns about a horrifying pilot program co-sponsored by the church and the federal government to gestate millions of frozen unused embryos by deploying the reproductive systems of nuns, beginning with her.
“Act III: The Dumpster” occurs late one night at the edge of a parking lot outside of a Dairy Queen in present-day Nazareth, Texas. That’s where teenaged Mary discovers a newborn child amid the reeking bags of trash. Mary frantically calls up her bestie Nevaeh for advice.
The opening play is broadly written as a domestic farce. The second and most ambitious work in the series sketches out a crude satirical cartoon with a nasty finish involving a shrill rendition of Ave, Maria and a brandished speculum. Beyond their dubious humor, these overextended one-acts intend to comment seriously upon women being forced to submit to misguided patriarchal authority.
A bleak comedy, “The Dumpster” proves to be the most straightforward work. A very young-looking Gracie Conn energizes the drama with her urgent performance as Mary, whose ever-distracted Gen Z brain feverishly conjures up numerous scenarios why a mother would abandon her child. The role is especially challenging to enact because Nevaeh remains an annoying, disembodied voice. Conn juggles a phone and the bundled infant while communicating her growing desperation and ultimate despair in a story that ends amid a Nativity creche outside a locked-down church.
Elsewhere, capable turns are delivered by a gleaming David Hull as glib, gung-ho Cardinal O’Malley and a lower-keyed Tracy Sallows as an increasingly appalled Mother Mary Joseph in the middle play. “The Virgin” is brightened considerably by Annalisa D’Aguilar, whose Mary sometimes looks directly at the audience in disbelief while her elders outline a future as the mother of Jesus. Her immediate response: “I don’t get to pick the name?”
Cappiello neatly stages the plays. A modest setting of a high stone wall designed by Forest Entsminger suffices for three locations as lighted appropriately by Lauren Bremen.
The Body of Mary opened September 15, 2026, at the Gym at Judson and runs through October 8. Tickets and information: thebodyofmary.com
