Press Release: “A Woman’s Heart” at Cotuit Center for the Arts

Cotuit Center for the Arts presents Judith Partelow’s highly acclaimed play, “A Woman’s Heart,” September 12 to 29 in the Black Box Theater. Performances are Thursday through Saturday at 7:30 PM, and Sunday at 2 PM. Story and direction is by Dana McCoy and Judith Partelow.

With Judith Partelow’s original poetry as its foundation, this new production of “A Woman’s Heart” is a captivating tale of friendship, heartache, and triumph. “The play is pure magic,” said Margaret Van Sant, executive director of Provincetown Dramatic Arts.

Three close friends (Partelow, McCoy, and Rod Owens) reconnect at their 50^th high school reunion to find that their mutual inspirations from and impacts on each other have not only endured, but have, ultimately, made all the difference in their respective lives.

“A Woman’s Heart” was first presented in 2017 and hailed as “funny, sexy, gutsy, and vulnerable.” In one of many rave reviews of earlier productions, Kelley Brocco-Hagen wrote, “The play was FANTASTIC! Touched my heart profoundly! This needs major exposure!”

This new collaboration by McCoy and Partelow reduces the number of characters from four to three and features a new story approach, shaping Partelow’s poetry into a compelling, music-filled journey through a writer’s life, and starring the collaborators themselves. Replete with life events and cultural references from the 1950s to the present, the play will resonate with all, particularly baby boomers.

The play is now also infused with the music of the boomer era, plus original music written by McCoy, Owens, and Partelow’s daughter Amanda Sevak.

An award-winning writer, as well as Actors’ Equity actor and director, Partelow began writing poetry when she was in third grade. Cape Cod journalist Caitlin Russell observed that Partelow has “a gift for taking heartbreaking subjects and shining a light on the pain, and the beauty and dignity born of struggling with it.”

The Cape Cod Writers Center recognized Partelow’s achievements at its 2019 conference with the Kevin V. Symmons Scholarship for Second Career Writers.

McCoy, an award-winning New York-based playwright, director, actor, singer, songwriter, and dancer, brings a wealth of talent and experience to creating and honing stories and bringing them successfully to the stage. Her theater credits include writer, performer, and producer for “Cube Rat,” which was performed at Edinburgh Fringe Festival and Off-Broadway (2011); and lead cast member and co-producer for “MoM: A Rock Concert Musical,” written by Richard Caliban, winner of Outstanding Musical at New York Fringe 2009, and selected as part of the Fringe Benefits Anniversary Series (2011) and The Almost Annual Festival (April 2013).

As a singer, songwriter, and instrumentalist, McCoy has topped Billboard charts and toured, directed, taught, and performed her own and other people’s original rock musicals internationally.

Rod Owens is an actor, musician, and artist who has appeared in “The Weight of Silence,” and other plays at Cotuit Center for the Arts.

“A Woman’s Heart” is produced by Janet Murphy Robertson of www.ArtistsAndMusicians.org.

Tickets are $20, $15 for members. Cotuit Center for the Arts is at 4404 Route 28 in Cotuit. For more information, visit www.artsonthecape.org or call 508-428-0669.

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What:

“A Woman’s Heart,” by Judith Partelow

Where:

Black Box Theater, Cotuit Center for the Arts, 4404 Route 28, Cotuit

When:

September 12 to 29, Thursday through Saturday at 7:30 PM; Sunday at 2 PM

Admission:

$20, $15 for members

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