Theatre: My name is Lucy Barton
11 October 2025 at 10:00
Spier Auditorium
A standing ovation for the woman who should have asked more questions: Lucy Barton. She invites the audience to a tell-all about her nine-week stay in a hospital in New York City.
Julie-Anne McDowell plays Lucy Barton in My Name is Lucy Barton. PHOTO: Supplied/Dean Manners
Recounting moments from her childhood, Lucy is caught between the ache of what was left unsaid and the tenderness of rediscovery. What begins as a simple hospital story quietly unravels into a recollection of loneliness, forgiveness, and the haunting persistence of memory.
Adapted from Elizabeth Sprout’s acclaimed 2016 novel, My Name is Lucy Barton is a one-woman play that relies entirely on the power of presence – and the minimalistic direction by Charmaine Weir-Smith lays the stage almost bare. The sterile whiteness of a hospital bed allows the world of Lucy’s Midwest childhood and, more importantly, her complicated relationship with her mother to emerge vividly throughout the 80-minute-long show.
The emotional precision with which Julie-Anne McDowell portrays Lucy amplifies the weight of two worlds: The one Lucy escaped from and the one she continues to long for. One such moment is when, while in her hospital bed, her mother briefly mentions her father, filling Lucy with rage.
Julie-Anne McDowell received a Naledi Theatre Awards nomination for Best Solo Performance for her portrayal of Lucy Barton in My Name is Lucy Barton. The play is directed by Charmaine Weir-Smith. PHOTO: Supplied/Dean Manners.
Her father barely ever showed her or her two siblings any affection. He lived his life haunted by his fatal shooting of two young German men. Yet, even on a hospital bed, Lucy does not ask her mother about “the thing” her father used to do when she was younger – she leaves the audience to conjecture what “the thing” could be.
Lucy is restrained yet devastated; each smile is a quiet battle between affection and pain. At times, speaking to her mother feels like an intimate confession; at others, it cuts like a reopened wound. When her mother takes her final breath in a hospital, Lucy’s “I love you” is met with complete silence. The silent audience becomes witness to the fragile battle between memory and reconciliation.
What makes My Name is Lucy Barton extraordinary is its honesty. The play resists the urge to dramatise grief; rather, it sits in grief. The soft, dim, almost hesitant lighting design mirrors this restraint, while Weir-Smith’s direction leaves room for silence to speak.
Julie-Anne McDowell (pictured). Adapted from Elizabeth Sprout’s acclaimed 2016 novel, My Name is Lucy Barton is a one-woman play that relies entirely on the power of presence – and the minimalistic direction by Charmaine Weir-Smith lays the stage almost bare. PHOTO: Supplied/Dean Manners
By the time the lights fade, Lucy has not found all her answers. And perhaps that is the point.
The power of My Name is Lucy Barton lies in what remains unresolved. It is a play that does not ask to be understood, but to be felt.
- My Name is Lucy Barton can be seen on 12 and 13 October 2025 at Spier Auditorium. Tickets are available on Quicket.