Kelly McAndrew (left) is Val, a Dallas lawyer, and Meredith Garretson is Nessa, a traveler in the clutches of Texas abortion laws, in Arlene Hutton’s drama Blood of the Lamb.
Arlene Hutton’s abortion-rights drama Blood of the Lamb arrives at an unusually timely moment. In the last few days NBC News has reported that maternal deaths in Texas increased 56% between 2019 and 2022, a period that includes the 2021 ban on abortion care in the state. Although Margot Bordelon says in her director’s note that the play began as a work of “speculative fiction,” the serendipity is a boon. The underlying story feels alarmingly real.
Two women face off in a Dallas airport waiting room. One is a lawyer, Val, appointed by the court following the Supreme Court’s overturning Roe v. Wade in what has become known as the Dobbs decision. Following that ruling, the Texas legislature enacted intrusive pregnancy laws. The second woman is Nessa, who has collapsed on an airplane from Los Angeles to New York, forcing a diversion to Dallas, where doctors have discovered the fetus she is carrying is dead. Nessa wants to continue flying to New York, but that doesn’t seem likely.
For all the potency of the subject matter, Hutton’s play proceeds by fits and starts, as Nessa, waking from anesthesia, tries to remember what happened to her, while Val puts off answering key inquiries because she’s mired in paperwork.
Nessa has a hard time coming to grips with the loss of her fetus.
Nessa: I need to get home to my doctor as quickly as possible. … So what do we do, what do I do, to make that happen?
Val: We should have a room for you soon.
Nessa: I thought you were a doctor.
Val: I’m a lawyer.
One may become irritated as the dialogue purposely delays answers and goes off on tangents. For instance, Nessa sidesteps a personal question with a non sequitur.
Val: Do you know if your husband has been notified?
Nessa: My cellphone was in my purse.
Val: We’ll need to notify your husband.
Nessa: My partner is on a ship off the coast of Antarctica at the moment, believe it or not, out of reach. A scientific exploration.
It’s not until much later that Val is enlightened about Nessa’s domestic arrangements, even though the mention of her “husband” is a logical moment to reveal it, and an astute listener will pick up on the evasion long before Val—the practicing lawyer, and a Bible Belt Christian—does. Given Kelly McAndrew’s no-nonsense phone calls to berate her incompetent superiors, it’s not credible that she would shrink from explaining the legal predicament to Nessa immediately.
Although Nessa keeps talking about flying on to New York, and about leaving her purse with her cellphone on the plane (highly unlikely that the airline wouldn’t have collected all her personal belongings when leaving her behind), it takes a while for Val to get to Texas’s brutal catch-22: “You can leave. But your baby can’t. The corpse is being held by the state.” If Nessa tries to get an abortion for the dead fetus in her womb, the dismemberment accompanying it will put her in jeopardy of felony charges for “abuse of a corpse” (this presumably is the speculative part).
Val has to put pressure on higher-ups, including legislators, during her session with Nessa. Photographs by Daniel Rader.
The playwright's dialogue often pushes logic to the limits. Nessa asks to see a lawyer and is easily distracted by Val for a while, but even after she grasps the situation, she never says, “I want the phone number of the ACLU.” It's a stretch to think the bureaucracy that Nessa and her partner have dealt with to become parents hasn't prepared her for Val.
At times, though, Hutton’s Kafkaesque dialogue can be effective:
Nessa: What are you writing down? …
Val: I’m reporting an accurate description of the events.
Nessa: From whose point of view? Mine or yours?
Val: From the baby’s point of view.
Val’s fundamentalist Christianity is an important plot point—as hinted by the title. Though Val seems to have come by her Christian values honestly, she undermines the integrity of her position with relentless obfuscation.
Nevertheless, both McAndrew as Val and Meredith Garretson as Nessa give strong performances, albeit often with staccato delivery that can become wearing. Andrew Boyce has provided a soulless room, soullessly lighted by Amith Chandrashaker.
It feels inevitable that Nessa will win the struggle, but Hutton irritatingly puts her thumb on the scale by having the devout Val confess to an adolescent abortion herself, making her stance inherently hypocritical, and therefore indefensible. One would be interested to hear the arguments, political and religious, that govern Val’s behavior without giving her a disqualifying character flaw.
As agitprop, Blood of the Lamb holds one’s attention and skillfully depicts a situation that, if it hasn’t yet occurred, seems frighteningly imminent.
Blood of the Lamb plays at 59E59 Theaters (59 E. 59th St.) through Oct. 20. Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. For tickets and more information, visit 59e59.org.
Playwright: Arlene Hutton
Director: Margot Bordelon
Scenic Design: Andrew Boyce
Costume Design: Sarita Fellows
Lighting Design: Amith Chandrashaker
Sound Design: UptownWorks
