“Is there something that your character experiences in The Mystery of Love & Sex or about the play in general that really resonates with you and intersects with your life?”

Lia MortensenLia Mortensen (Lucinda)

As a divorced mother (of a certain age!) of two daughters, one in college, Lucinda speaks to me on so many levels. And this connection is why the play speaks to me in such a tremendously deep way. The Mystery of Love & Sex spotlights Charlotte and Jonny’s journey foremost, and yet the parents’ openness and curiosity to their daughter’s world gives me such hope. My own daughter’s journey towards womanhood is vastly different than my own. Sexual fluidity being just one of the differences that I have been fortunate enough to examine and accept. Lucinda finds herself at a crossroads in her life when she decides HER road matters. As a mother, my girls came first for so long. And now that they are very much on their way, the question presents itself, “what now?” I think it takes great courage to make choices at this point in my life for me. It’s scary, exciting and foreign to start living for oneself again. And Lucinda does it in a bold, courageous way! I look forward to “living” this story and finding out where I come out on the other side. Read more about Lia Mortensen.

Hayley BurgessHayley Burgess (Charlotte)

What I love about this play and about the lives of these characters is the chaos—the chaos that springs from sexual tension and sexual shame and sexual awakening. And (just to use the word chaos one more time) the chaos that comes from loving each other so tirelessly and so volcanically. It seems inevitable that children grow up having this idea of who they think their parents want them to be and parents have this idea of who they think their children want them to be—be it relative family or chosen family. That is something that resonates with me and something I can’t imagine ever really goes away. How do you narrow the gap between who you are in the privacy of your own thoughts and who you are to the people who love you? Unburdening yourself is a surprisingly complicated task, and this play epitomizes that. Read more about Hayley Burgess.