Seeking ‘Sanctuary’ in Santa Maria

Sanctuary City, by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Martyna Majok, makes its Central Coast debut in what could scarcely be a more timely moment. The powerful coming-of-age story is set in Newark in 2001, shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but it could easily be taking place in any city right now. 

In the coming-of-age story, two teens (named simply B and G for boy and girl) forge a deep bond amid the complexities of immigration, identity, belonging and love, grappling with the uncertainty of their futures and what they are willing to risk for each other in the only country they’ve known as home. The rave review in the New York Times when the play opened off-Broadway in 2021 called Sanctuary City the latest in Majok’s “unsparing, unsentimental vision of America … friendly to guests in theory, fiercely rejecting in fact … A place where the airy abstractions of policy play out in the anguish of personality.”

PCPA’s production will take the stage at the Severson Theatre in Santa Maria. Directed by UCSB grad Sarah Rademacher – Co-Founder and former Artistic Director of Elements Theatre Collective –  Sanctuary City runs February 27-March 16. 

Visit www.pcpa.org