Sea View Playwright’s Theatre proudly presented Vita & Virginia, a luminous, intimate, and passionate play that brings to life one of the most iconic queer love stories of the 20th century in June 2025.
Here’s a review written about the production: https://raqueltys.substack.com/p/my-encounters-with-virginia-woolf
As the Director, I (Danielle Bacibianco), also wrote an article with reflections on the play: https://medium.com/@drbacibianco/write-it-coming-home-to-woolf-f55a662857f3
AND, The Staten Island Advance/SI Live was generous enough to cover the play in its local news. To read, click here: https://www.silive.com/entertainment/2025/06/find-a-way-to-celebrate-love-vita-virginia-comes-to-staten-island-stage-for-pride-month.html
Written by Eileen Atkins, “Vita & Virginia” is a play adapted from the real secret letters exchanged between writer and socialite Vita Sackville-West and modernist novelist Virginia Woolf.
Having not only read this play, but also taught it, Vita & Virginia invites readers and audiences into the private, poetic world of two women who defied the constraints of their time to find, in each other, both desire and deep intellectual kinship.
Spanning over two decades, their correspondence is filled with flirtation, fervor, heartache, passion, and literary ambition.
This production is not just a play — it’s a love letter. Through the epistolary structure, we watch as their words fold time and space, becoming both a record and an enactment of lesbian longing.
I believe Vita’s & Virginia’s letters echo their vulnerability and humor, with wit and ache. In Vita & Virginia, longing is not only spoken — it is written, rewritten, and reimagined, across oceans and decades.
To have the opportunity to bring it to audiences, I was reminded that — yes, even as a lesbian myself – queer passion and desire often lives on the page before it can live out loud.
Set against a rich backdrop of 1920s-1930s England, our staging conjures the emotional landscapes of both Woolf’s inner life and Sackville-West’s vibrant intensity.
This is a play for lovers of literature, for dreamers, for those who know that desire often first finds its voice in ink.
And we had 5 unforgettable nights and audiences that honored the unruly beauty of Vita’s and Virginia’s love!
Each evening began with pre-show festivities an hour before curtain — featuring live entertainment, hot tea, coffee, and cookies in our cozy lobby space. And as a small token of our appreciation, each guest received a signature white rose with their playbill — a symbol of enduring love, and a nod to the elegance of Vita & Virginia’s time.
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Cast:
Mary McConnell as Virginia Woolf
Lillie Schenkel as Vita Sackville-West
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Creative Team:
Director: Danielle Bacibianco
Stage Manager: Des Deserio
Lighting Designer: Maria Russell
Sound Designer: Gary J. Moore
Costume Designer: Joey Senise
Costume Assistant: Nora Shvartsberg
Graphic Design: Joe Gambino
Dramaturge: Lauren Keffler
Set Mural Artist: Melanie Rodriguez
Production Assistants: Jenny Kelly, Helene Montagna
Master of the Gels: Frank Nigro
Production Photos: Jodi Garda, Danielle Bacibianco
This production was funded, in part, by the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency Statewide Community Regrant Program with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; administered by Staten Island Arts.
2025 Vita & Virginia Performance Dates:
Friday, June 6 – 8 PM OPENING
Saturday, June 7 – 8 PM
Sunday, June 8 – 2 PM
Friday, June 13 – 8 PM
Saturday, June 14 – 8 PM CLOSING
