Virtual performances of City Theatre’s Recent Production “Cry It Out”

If you’re missing live cultural events, Pittsburgh’s City Theatre now offers the next best thing. For a pick-your-price fee of $10 or more you can view the company’s latest play online. Cry It Out, by American playwright Molly Smith Metzler, is a new sociocomedy about the adventures of early-stage motherhood. The live production had to be canceled partway into its run but a professional-quality video exists, which can be streamed through April 5. Cry It Out imagines three women with newborns who meet and exchange experiences. They’re all working moms on maternity leave, so each is in the unusual position of being housebound with a wee one—a highly relatable subject for these days when so many of us are housebound!

The three mothers in the play are from quite different backgrounds: one a corporate professional woman, one a low-income single mom, and one a fabulously wealthy jewelry designer. As a synopsis from the play’s publisher puts it, Cry It Out examines “the absurdities of being home with a baby, the power of female friendship, the dilemma of going back to work, and the effect class has on parenthood in America.” City Theatre’s cast has Julianne Avolio, Sarah Goeke, and Rebecca Hirota as the moms, with Pittsburgh-area favorite Tim McGeever as the lone guy in Cry It Out. (MV)