Registration for this event will open at 12 PM on Friday, April 4.
by D-Davis
Showtimes
Friday, April 25 @ 3:30 PM
Friday, April 25 @ 8 PM
Saturday, April 26 @ 3:30 PM
Hope endures. Through time, through struggle, through the ever-present battle between autonomy and control. A Meditation on Hope is a powerful drama that traverses centuries, interweaving the voices of women, past and present, as they navigate a world that seeks to dictate their choices.
Bette Singer, a chief of fetal medicine, has built her life around faith in the American Dream—believing in personal success, moral integrity, and duty to the law. But when an 1864 Arizona law banning abortion is reinstated on the day of the solar eclipse, her world is thrown into crisis.
Spanning a Puritan-era quilting circle to a modern hospital at the center of political upheaval, this gripping play examines faith, bodily autonomy, and family bonds. When history repeats itself, will hope be enough to sustain those left fighting for the future?
About the Playwright
D-Davis lives in NYC. Her plays have been developed or produced at the New Ohio Theatre, Primary Stages, New York Theatre Workshop, Howl Playwrights, AMIOS, HB Studios, Goddard College, and Columbia University. Diane’s most recent workshop productions were Broken Thread (Femme Collective), Night Becomes Morning (Chain Theatre), What’s What (Polaris Theater), Memorial Tree (Columbia University) and COMPLICITY (New Ohio) which also received an HB Studio Residency Award. Diane was also awarded an Honor Roll Intensive Residency at The Workshop Theater for Broken Thread and a Dramatic Question Theater Fellowship for Girls Play Bass. She studied acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, earned a BA in theater from Bennington College, and a MA in history from CUNY. D-Davis is part of the 2025 Playwriting Cohort at Columbia University, a playwright in residence at Theater East and HOWL playwrights, and is a member of the Actors Studio Playwright and Directors Unit and Dramatist Guild. She currently works with The Tent Theater Company as their Literary Associate.
About the New Plays Festival
Columbia University School of the Arts presents a festival of new plays written by the 2025 Columbia MFA Playwriting Cohort. The esteemed faculty who nurtured these students, including Tony©, Pulitzer, and Obie Award winners, such as Lynn Nottage, Rogelio Martinez, Blair Singer, Noelle Vinas, Charles L. Mee, Michael Korie, David Auburn, and David Henry Hwang invite everyone to experience these innovative new playwrights.
Organized by Leslie Ayvazian, Theatre.