←Recommendations of Wolves At The Door

Premiere Stages, the professional Equity theatre company in residence at Kean University, is pleased to recognize Wolves At The Door as a Semi-Finalist for the 2025 Premiere Play Festival. The play rose through a competitive process to become distinguished among 805 submissions. Our panel was impressed by the precise narrative of such unthinkable loss, and the introduction of each "wolf" presenting a new, unforeseen challenge in the couple's healing. Our congratulations and thanks to Ali.

This play was on my reading list for a long time and I procrastinated reading it because I knew I would find it devastating for the topic of mass shooting alone. And I was right. But I also overwhelmed by the evocative writing and how well Ali MacLean was able to draw us into the hearts of these characters. The play not only shows us the obvious horror of this appalling and unnatural death but the horrible and inhumane aftermath. As these parents are grieving they must deal with a deluge of others who reach out to them for their

An intense, heart-wrenching look at the aftermath of gun violence that reminds you that tragedy continues long after the tragic event. Ali MacLean creates a play that will fill you with outrage, empathy, sadness, and eventual hope. A moving and beautiful play that speaks humanity into an issue that's devolved into impersonal partisan bickering.

So much focus is on the topic of gun violence, but rarely captures the aftermath in such a poignant way as MacLean does with this play. There are plenty of characters that make us question the motives of those who are "here to help". Heartbreaking, but hopeful, showing the only way to deal with grief is to break through - and that there are messages from beyond if we choose to see them.
(one of the most well-written villains is in this play - chilling!)

It’s hard to hold it together when you see the fallout from a shooting. There are wolves at the door and MacLean introduces us to all of them. Closure seems impossible. This is a uniquely American tragedy and nobody is left off the hook. It’s a topic that is hard to explore but for the sake of all of our innocents - exploration, discussion, and action must happen. MacLean has provided you with a start. The ending brought me up short and I was grateful for the last scene. But haunted by the memories of Lucy.

After reading this play, I was completely gutted. A harrowing examination of America's psychology in the wake of repeated gun violence. The play is bold, confrontational while still managing to be tender and sensitive. An absolute gem of a play.

WOLVES AT THE DOOR is a searing window into the personal tragedy behind the headlines of gun violence. The play centers on the mother of a little girl murdered in a mass shooting. Despite a series of well-meaning interventions from her husband, her ex, a pastor, a psychic, and law-enforcement, her grief cannot be unabated. Meanwhile, her rage is further inflamed by the violent harassment she is forced to endure. WOLVES AT THE DOOR which dramatizes the futility of “thoughts and prayers" while also giving us a simple and heartbreaking portrait of grief, packs a punch.