Wounded, the searing new play written by Jiggs Burgess and directed by Del Shores (Cheatin’, Sordid Lives, Southern Baptist Sissies), is making its World Premiere at New York City’s iconic SoHo Playhouse.  With only one word, it’s a hard-hitting title. Is the playwright exploring physical wounds? Emotional wounds? Both? The intrigue is only heightened by the cover art of the play’s program, which is awash with enigmatic symbolism.

That said, the first act of Wounded hardly hints at any potential dark elements of Burgess’ play; in fact, it inspires hearty laughter as soon as the audience hears one of the characters deliver the first “Bless her heart!”. Yes, indeed, Wounded takes place in the South– specifically, a small Texas town.  The small-town Southern setting, in fact, colors almost every aspect of the play: Everyone seems to know each other. The characters claim to abhor cussing, yet eventually let the F-bombs fly, albeit in a Southern accent. Gossip about their neighbors’ sordid lives flows as freely as the endless glasses of sweet tea.  The first character we meet is Katie (Kristen McCullough), the single mother and full-time caretaker of a disabled 13-year-old girl named Elizabeth, nicknamed “Sparrow”.  Katie and Sparrow, who is confined to a wheelchair, are spending the afternoon in a sunny public park. We learn that Sparrow has been disabled from a hit-and-run accident a few years ago.  In addition to being a full-time caregiver, Katie is also constantly interrupted by phone calls from her over-protective mother Birdie who is literally spying on Katie from the other side of the park.  As the audience, we admire Katie’s devotion to her child, and feel for her physical and emotional exhaustion… but also can’t help laughing at her, especially when she threatens to send her mother to a place called Azle Manor, or when she delivers lines like “You stay away from those boys, you hear? I don’t want to disparage folks, but that gene pool has been stagnant since Eve ate that apple!”  Katie and Sparrow’s afternoon in the park is disrupted by the arrival of a larger-than-life, colorful stranger.  That stranger is Carrol (Craig Taggart), a middle-aged author who enters the scene with all the subtlety of a flamboyance of flamingoes.  The two “Strangers on a Park Bench” don’t exactly become fast friends; this mother hen and peacock do an extended “war dance”, complete with the two trading quips.  Carrol tells Katie, “You are just strung tighter than Dolly Parton’s bra straps!”, and Katie makes constant references to a gun in her purse.  However, it turns out that the two aren’t exactly total strangers. We learn that Carrol knows Katie’s mother.   (This is, after all, a small town…)  The two S-L-O-W-L-Y bond over gossip, and it’s not long before they open up and share each other’s stories– as well as revealing some small-town secrets.  Thanks to the brilliant acting of both McCollough-as-Katie and Taggart-as-Carrol, as well as Shores’ direction, the interactions between these two accidental friends is both tear-jerkingly provocative and smartly hilarious.  Act 1 ends with Carrol leaving the park to prepare for a visit by a “gentleman caller”.  

Had Wounded ended after Act 1, it could have very easily, in my opinion, held its own as a standalone performance: To borrow a quote from another Southern-themed piece, “Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion.”  However, Act 2 of Wounded continues the laugh-out-loud comedy and the touching humanity– while adding a generous dose of psychodrama.  This time, the setting is Carrol’s house, and the aforementioned “gentleman caller” is revealed to be Robert (Shaw Jones), a rugged boyhood classmate of Carrol’s who has spent some time in jail. In contrast to Carroll’s nervous energy (He tells his free-range pet hummingbirds, “Listen, I am nervous as a bull calf on branding day, so just pipe down? You hear?“) as he waits for his guest to arrive.), his former schoolmate (crush?) Robert is reserved, austere, and more than bit like a boiling pot with its contents under extreme pressure.  As the two men talk about the past, revelations come to light, and emotions are nakedly revealed.  The feeling of tension in builds up in the second act of Wounded until it almost becomes unbearable for the viewer.  We know that SOMETHING is going to happen.  But it’s unlikely that even the most astute of audience members would be ready for the final, VERY unexpected twist.

The performances by all three actors is flawless.  Kristen McCullough is perfectly cast as the willowy, blonde Katie, who singlehandedly puts the lore of the Southern belle to its long-overdue end once and for all.  (Katie’s monologue at the end of the first act is a scorcher.). As Robert, Shaw Jones is astonishing in his skill for wordless acting: With a quiver of the lip or squint of the eyes, he singlehandedly takes credit for the tense mood of Act 2.  And, of course, there’s Craig Taggard as Carrol, who is on stage the entire run of the play, armed with his endless machine gun-style delivery of one-liners (“Don’t wave a steak at a starving man!”, he tells his hunky houseguest.) As an unapologetic “Southern Baptist sissy”, Carrol keeps the audiences laughing throughout the entire run time, even as his loudly dressed character shows a few new (true) colors towards the end of the play. That said, there’s no shortage of pathos for all three characters; when it comes to pain and suffering, all three are right up there with Elizabeth Taylor.  It’s no mystery why Mr. Burgess tapped Del Shores to direct Wounded; Shores’ works often explore themes of LGBTQ+ identity, Southern culture, and dysfunctional family dynamics– all with a sense of humor.  Jiggs Burgess’ script also deserves credit for taking some very Tennessee Williams-esque themes and making them feel more relevant than ever for audiences in 2025.   

Wounded is highly recommended! The show continues through Sunday, March 16th at SoHo Playhouse, 15 Vandam Street, New York City.  Visit here for tickets and more info!

The cast includes Shaw Jones, Kristen McCullough and Craig Taggart. The Production Team includes Evan Frank (Set Design), Carter Ford (Light Design), Adam Matthew (Sound Design), Tori Moss (Production Stage Manager) and Miranda Shaffer (Assistant Stage Manager).  Wounded is Produced by SoHo Playhouse (Artistic Director Darren Lee Cole, Managing Director Britt Lafield) and Beard Collins Shores Productions (Emerson Collins, Louise H. Beard, and Del Shores.)

Photos by Russ Rowland.