For the remainder of the year, my San Jose and Peninsula theater reviews will be posted on Talkin’ Broadway with only introductions to those reviews on this site]. Please continue to https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/regional/sanjose/sj299.html for full review.

In 1868, Louisa May Alcott published Little Women, and the world of women’s literature was forever changed.  Indeed, the lives of many girls and women have been altered by exposure to this great domestic story of the four March sisters of Concord, Massachusetts.  Even today, most theater goers are probably familiar with the work at some level.

Co-commissioner TheatreWorks Silicon Valley offers its version of Lauren Gunderson’s theatrical adaptation.  The script stays generally true to the author’s intentions, and the production is professional in all respects, resulting in a lively, poignant, and delightful rendering of Alcott’s semi-autobiographical work.  Since it takes place during the Civil War, a period of political division, and since there is a scarlet fever epidemic, parallels with current times are unavoidable.

First, some context that influenced her life and writings.  Louisa May Alcott grew up largely in Concord, Mass in a family of four girls, one of which, like Beth March, contracted scarlet fever (sound familiar yet?).  As a child, Louisa’s mentors included her parents’ friends Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Nathaniel Hawthorne!  In addition to these obvious literary influences, her persona was defined by the isms to which she subscribed – feminism, abolitionism, suffragism, and prohibitionism.  Like Jo March, the sister in the novel who is her surrogate, Alcott sought independence of mind and action outside the home, having become a nurse in the Civil War.  She eschewed marriage, or perhaps it eschewed her.

Since this is not the first stage adaptation, what would be Gunderson’s point of differentiation?  Her version uses two devices that elaborate on the action and make up for the condensation of a long novel into a short play.  First is that Elissa Beth Stebbins, who plays Jo, also plays Alcott as a narrator who gives overall perspectives and a modern look at the story.  One modernization that may be more in the direction than the writing is that Jo comes across as more masculine, even insisting to take the man’s part when dancing with Laurie.  He is correspondingly more effeminate than Alcott probably intended.

The other alteration is the extensive use of parenthetical commentary spoken directly to the audience.  This occurs in several forms.  Personas share their inner thoughts; reveal subtexts of the action; advance the plot; and even provide stage directions.  Some viewers will find this annoying.  I appreciate the conceit for taking the story deeper with efficiency, and I hope others do as well……..

Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, a rolling world premiere written by Lauren Gunderson, is co-commissioned and produced by TheatreWorks Silicon Valley and plays at Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro Street, Mountain View, CA through October 12, 2025.