According to the Chorus
By Arlene Hutton
In the basement quick change room of a Broadway theater in the mid-1980s, the chorus girls are at war with their dressers. Will the new dresser, with her own sad past and uncertain future, be able to navigate this minefield?
According to the Chorus is a funny, nostalgic behind-the-scenes look at a pivotal period in the history of Broadway where women’s issues and the AIDS crisis play out through the everyday lives of Equity performers and union dressers. With a cast of twelve and a dog, this is ensemble work in the spirit of Balm in Gilead and Hot in Baltimore.
Arlene Hutton (she/her/hers) is the author of Last Train to Nibroc, which received a New York Drama League Best Play nomination and was a finalist for the Francesca Primus Prize. Regional theatre credits include B Street, Chester Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Florida Studio Theatre, Kitchen Theatre, Mad Cow, Rubicon Theatre, and Washington Stage Guild. Her plays, including I Dream Before I Take the Stand and As It Is In Heaven, have been presented at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Off- and Off-Off-Broadway, in London and throughout the world. Her works have been published by Dramatists Play Service, Samuel French, Playscripts, and Dramatic Publishing and appear in textbooks and best play anthologies.
An alumna of New Dramatists and member of Ensemble Studio Theatre, Honor Roll!, New Circle Theatre Company, and New Light Theater Project, Hutton is a three-time winner of the Samuel French Short Play Festival, nine-time finalist for the Heideman Award, and recipient of the Lippman and Calloway awards. She has received commissions and grants from the EST/Sloan Foundation, NYSCA, the Bushwick Starr pet project, the South Carolina Arts Commission, the Educational Theatre Association, the Big Bridge Theatre Consortium, the Carthage College New Play Initiative, and Cherry Lane Alternative. Hutton has taught at the College of Charleston, Fordham University and the Sewanee Writers Conference and was twice named the Tennessee Williams Fellow at the University of the South. Residencies include the Australian National Playwrights Conference, Blue Mountain Center, MacDowell Colony, SPACE at Ryder Farm, VCCA, Winterthur and Yaddo. Based in New York City, she is on the faculty of Goddard College and teaches playwriting at The Barrow Group.
Top: Joy Donze, Tabitha Gayle, Iraisa Ann Reilly, Sofia Ayral-Hutton, Judith Hiller, and Kleo Mitrokostas. Bottom: Karen Ziemba and company. Photos: Hunter Canning.










