QUEEN OF LUCIA:
‘Queen of Lucia’ tunes up prior to full production
January 27, 2026
By Eva Trieger
LA JOLLA, California –I find it thrilling to track the evolution of a play. When you get to see a show grow from a seedling into a sapling and then actually put down roots before emerging as a fully grown tree, it’s a rare treat and feels as though you’ve been let in on a secret.
Recently, I attended a staged reading of Queen of Lucia. Writer Lisa Balderston conceived this play, and it was first read by Scripteasers of San Diego. With some critiques and suggested edits, the script underwent modifications and appeared again on the Lamplighters La Mesa stage.
The cast could not have been one ounce stronger. The three individuals on stage, and the Narrator (John Tessmer) delivered a reading that was emotion packed, credible and haunting. The 80-minute production plucked at virtually every human sensibility. There is some humor woven into the very serious content. The shifting between affection, anger, grief and pain is visceral and the pacing between one moment to the next is perfectly timed.
A married couple, both college English professors, are taking a weekend away in a cabin. This escape is intended to help Elena (Rhiannon McAfee) and Jim (Charles Peters) heal their relationship which has been upended with Elena’s diagnosis of bipolar disorder. Her loving and perpetually patient husband just wants to indulge her in hopes of restoring her to mental health and emotional stability.
Elena is skeptical and perhaps even paranoid about Jim’s motives and after having been hospitalized for a period, is angry and mistrusting of Jim. To make matters worse, Elena has created an imaginary friend whom only she can hear and see. Hal (Jamie Feinstein), this hallucination, feeds Elena’s fears and encourages her to lash out at Jim in hurtful ways.
Following this reading, the play will receive a full stage production at a location as yet unknown. There will be additional changes made to the second act. It is this writer’s hope that the cast will remain a constant as each of the actors did a supreme job of portraying their character. Keep tuned for a production of Queen of Lucia in autumn of 2026.
Trieger is a freelancer specializing in the coverage of the arts.
AWARD WINNING PLAYWRIGHT: RICHARD FOUTS
Congratulation Lisa on a fabulous work. Your play kept me engaged every second. Superb story idea, and excellent dialogue. Great setting (which is always a strategic decision on the part of writers that we often forget). When I studied with Lauren Gunderson she always advised we take learnings from everything we see, and I have some really good ones from this play. I love the organic exposition and the slow build. It was like an onion, watching layer upon layer reveal more information. And I really loved the ebbs and flows, the ups and downs. And the final scenes were just heart-wrenching especially when she announces taking her own life (and why she wants to do it). She thinks it’s her gift to Jack, to free him of her, but then he’s devastated because he’s so willing to keep investing in her. OMG it was so good!
I felt like I was watching Eugene O’Neill, it’s that good. I can’t think of one thing you could do differently (but obviously looking forward to the thriller version which just sound so delicious)
AWARD WINNING PLAYWRIGHT: SARAH ALIDA LeCLAIR
Powerful brave work from La Jolla Theatre Ensemble with Lisa Balderston’s “Queen of Lucia” this week taking a deep dive into not only the experience of living with mental illness from the inside (Balderston’s “Elena”, played with chaotic savagery by Rhiannon McAfee has bipolar disorder and experiences hallucinations in physical form when Jamie Feinstein shows up to give voice to her darkest intrusive thoughts) but how wrenching it is to be a caretaker for someone who can’t give back whatsoever. Particularly gripping was Elena’s husband’s secret file “Issues to Resolve”, which the audience certainly thought would be about committing her, or selling the house, or telling her about an affair but which turned out to be a heart breaking list of things he was personally grappling with to protect his own mental health in the midst of the backbreaking work of caretaking for her.
It’s my belief that we advocate best when we allow those outside the marginalized group to speak to each other, and the playwright giving this monologue to the mentally ill person to speak for the caretakers rather than him trying to plead for himself was brilliant.
Watch for it in October when this will make it to the stage in a full production. Thank you John Tessmer as always for advocating for playwrights and for local art.
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LIFE BY NUMBERS:
THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE: SAN DIEGO MAGAZINE: Art & Culture – The Best Things to do This Weekend: June 7-9, 2024 (Life by Numbers written by Lisa Balderston)
A Review from San Diego Jewish World:
In This Play, Daughter is Overbearing, Not Trusting of Mother’s Choices by Eva Trieger
LA MESA, California — We are all familiar with the stereotypic overbearing, guilt-inducing, boundary-defying Jewish mother who doesn’t trust a son or daughter to make good choices. A new play, written by Lisa Balderston, Life by Numbers, introduces us to a role reversal as thirty-something Ellie is at odds with her mother’s life choices in the wake of her father’s death. This production was not part of the regular season but in conjunction with the Playwrights Project that features local playwrights.
This play opened Friday night in the intimate space of Lamplighters Community Theatre, tucked away in the corner of a La Mesa shopping center. This final show of the 85th season tackled some difficult terrain, but today’s nearly full house seemed to appreciate the story, direction, acting and set if one were to judge by the applause and standing ovation the play received.
I exchanged a few emails with the playwright prior to today’s performance and Balderston is one busy person. In addition to writing plays, she is an Assistant Director, Point Loma Nazarene University teacher and mom to two sons.
Life by Numbers coincides with Pride month, and this is fitting as the content explores several relationships. There is the sibling rivalry between Ellie (Ell Miller) and Adam (Steven Ronggur Silalahi), a brother and sister who hash out who is each parent’s favorite. There is the acerbic neighbor, Mrs. Gomez (Lucinda Moany) who, while intimidating, is also wise and compassionate. There is the longing for a connection to the deceased, and I can’t leave out the spirit of Mrs. G’s dead cat!
Mom (Lesa Sailors) has been a widow for two years, and though she loved her husband, has found new facets and interests and is allowing herself to live a more fully expressed life, which is equal parts unexpected and devastating to her daughter, Ellie. Nic (Laura Ganz-Holtan) is an Art teacher who encourages students to find aspects of themselves through exploration on the canvas, offering the freedom to see what emerges.
The cast has very cohesive synergy and each actor is truly gifted in his/her own right. Under the direction of Julia Smith, the truly authentic characters navigate their relationships and interactions genuinely. When I looked at the program, I did not realize I had seen the majority of these actors on other local San Diego stages and I was reminded of the great pool of talent we have right here in our backyard!
The play contains a serious message about acceptance, love, disappointment and compassion. It also invites viewers to release their commitment to what is “normal” or “acceptable.” We can see how a strong emotion like love should not cave to convention or to societal norms. That said, there is humor built into the dialogue and characters, and the overarching sensation is that of hopefulness and progress. This reviewer shed a few tears when characters revealed their vulnerable selves, but I left the theatre with a sense of peace and optimism for this family.
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TRANSPORTED:
Play Deals With Healing After Hate Crime Killings
The world premiere of a play that explores the varied ways two families — united in tragedy due to gun violence and a hate crime — respond to their heartbreak opens at PowPAC on Jan. 28.
“Transported” by San Diego playwright Lisa Balderston can be seen on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays through Feb. 20 at PowPAC, Poway’s Community Theatre. Director Gil Savage, who is also PowPAC artistic director, said the play was chosen because of its message.
“The show addresses the horrors that automatic weapons do every year,” Savage said. “The primary message is about the horror of this mass murder caused by a hate crime … and how it destroys society.”
“When I read it I said we got to do this play because it has an important message,” he said. The play revolves around two Latino families. In Act I, the families come together to celebrate the marriage of their sons. But later that night, the young men — off stage — go to a gay nightclub to continue celebrating with friends and are victims of a hate-based mass shooting.
Act II is set a few years later, when the two grieving mothers — who were close friends before the tragedy — and the sister of one of the men meet by chance on a train. Since the murders, one mother has become a gun control advocate, whose mission has become preventing another tragedy like the one that caused the death of her son. The other mother has withdrawn, concluding nothing will ever change society, Savage said.
“So it is about learning to live together,’ Savage said. “Those who commit hate crimes affect and destroy families, not just the individual. Families have to pull together. It is about their faith and strength.”
“(The characters) have to keep their heart open and remember … faith in family gets you through (anything). … It is through support and relying on faith that they get great strength,” he said. Balderston wrote “Transported” as a one-act play and there were performed readings in 2019 at Scripps Ranch Theatre and OnStage Playhouse in Chula Vista, Savage said. Since then, she expanded it into a two-act play and this is the first time it is being staged.
“It has been in development for more than a year,” Savage said, adding Balderston is “super talented and has a future in the theater world.” Balderston, a San Diego native, earned a bachelor’s in English from San Diego State University and a master’s in creative writing and literature for educators from Fairleigh Dickinson University. She is an adjunct professor at Point Loma Nazarene University. Working with a playwright is something Savage has done before. The Scripps Ranch resident began his theater career as a 15-year-old with The Old Globe back in the mid-1960s.
“I’ve always been in love with community theater and starting or originating works,” said Savage, who has been with PowPAC for 10 years. Savage said casting the show during a pandemic has been a challenge, with some actors needing to be replaced due to “problems beyond our control.” To audition, all actors had to be fully vaccinated against COVID.
“There was not the typical turnout of actors at auditions, which we totally understand,” he said. “It is rough to rehearse in masks, though they will not perform with masks.” The cast consists of Suzanne Whitman, Laura Gracie, Tim Benson, Kanaan Hesseling, Rayne Gonzalez, Kevin McGinnis and Gyanesh Billakanti.
LISA BALDERSTON 