Wolf Play

November 20, 2025 - November 22, 2025 |7:00pm

Add to Calendar 2025-11-20 19:00:00 2025-11-22 19:00:00 Wolf Play Wolf Play by Hansol Jung Directed by Gisela Cardenas Thursday, November 20, 7pm — GET TICKETS! Friday, November 21, 7pm — GET TICKETS! Saturday, November 22, 2pm — GET TICKETS! Saturday, November 22, 7pm — GET TICKETS! Glicker-Milstein Theatre, Diana LL200 Tickets: $14 general admission $7 with BC/CUID Wolf Play Director's Statement Jeenu, a young Korean boy initially adopted by a couple and then re-homed online to a new family, is wild, untamed, and determined to survive in a world that uses and discards him like an object. He brings chaos into his new home, but also a “rewirement” of the idea of belonging and the meaning of finding your pack. We often like to believe that family is the last refuge of intimacy, a place where a child is protected from the brutal logic of the market. However, Wolf Play confronts us with the obscenity of this belief. At the beginning of the play, the child is literally treated as a commodity on the Internet, as if Amazon now offered next-day delivery of human souls. The boy, imagining himself as a wolf, acts out the animality that our polite symbolic order tries to tame. He breaks through –claws and all— to shatter his new family’s ideals, who are themselves attempting to rewire traditional notions of family and identity. Wolf Play invites us to examine accepted ways of understanding identity, family, masculinity, and community. In this play, those who question heteronormative and patriarchal lenses carry the stigma of being othered –seen as wild creatures who must fight, whether in a real boxing ring or at court, to have the right to find their pack in this world. This play explores the animal side within all of us. On one side, the fiery nature of those who refuse to be tamed and strive to create a more open world; on the other, the darker instincts of self-centered individuals who exploit more vulnerable subjects, treating them as objects, and stripping our world of its soul. I once heard the phrase that a parent does not own a child but only guards the child’s soul. Wolf Play extends this idea beyond genetics and into adoptive parenthood. Robin and Ash –the nonbinary couple fighting their way into a binary world— become Jeenu’s soul-guardians: three wolves, one pack. -- Gisela Cardenas, Director Scenic & Lighting Designer Maruti Evans Costume Designer Oana Botez Sound Designer Sophie Simons Assistant Director Yueqi Yang Stage Manager Samantha Grooms with Barnard and Columbia students Barnard College barnard-admin@digitalpulp.com America/New_York public
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Wolf Play

by Hansol Jung
Directed by Gisela Cardenas

Thursday, November 20, 7pm — GET TICKETS!
Friday, November 21, 7pm — GET TICKETS!
Saturday, November 22, 2pm — GET TICKETS!
Saturday, November 22, 7pm — GET TICKETS!

Glicker-Milstein Theatre, Diana LL200

Tickets:
$14 general admission
$7 with BC/CUID

Wolf Play Director's Statement

Jeenu, a young Korean boy initially adopted by a couple and then re-homed online to a new family, is wild, untamed, and determined to survive in a world that uses and discards him like an object. He brings chaos into his new home, but also a “rewirement” of the idea of belonging and the meaning of finding your pack.

We often like to believe that family is the last refuge of intimacy, a place where a child is protected from the brutal logic of the market. However, Wolf Play confronts us with the obscenity of this belief. At the beginning of the play, the child is literally treated as a commodity on the Internet, as if Amazon now offered next-day delivery of human souls. The boy, imagining himself as a wolf, acts out the animality that our polite symbolic order tries to tame. He breaks through –claws and all— to shatter his new family’s ideals, who are themselves attempting to rewire traditional notions of family and identity.

Wolf Play invites us to examine accepted ways of understanding identity, family, masculinity, and community. In this play, those who question heteronormative and patriarchal lenses carry the stigma of being othered –seen as wild creatures who must fight, whether in a real boxing ring or at court, to have the right to find their pack in this world.

This play explores the animal side within all of us. On one side, the fiery nature of those who refuse to be tamed and strive to create a more open world; on the other, the darker instincts of self-centered individuals who exploit more vulnerable subjects, treating them as objects, and stripping our world of its soul.

I once heard the phrase that a parent does not own a child but only guards the child’s soul. Wolf Play extends this idea beyond genetics and into adoptive parenthood. Robin and Ash –the nonbinary couple fighting their way into a binary world— become Jeenu’s soul-guardians: three wolves, one pack.

-- Gisela Cardenas, Director

Scenic & Lighting Designer Maruti Evans
Costume Designer Oana Botez
Sound Designer Sophie Simons
Assistant Director Yueqi Yang
Stage Manager Samantha Grooms
with Barnard and Columbia students

Performing Arts