Booked & Scene

We Had a World by Joshua Harmon, directed by Keira Fromm at The Huntington, is a funny, biting, and deeply personal memory play that follows Joshua as he pieces together the complicated legacy of his mother and grandmother. Told through shifting timelines and direct commentary with the audience, the play lives in that blurry space between what actually happened and how we remember it, asking what it means to love people you don’t always understand and how family stories get carried onward and told to future generations.

Mother Knows Best And She’s Got It Handled: Eva Kaminsky as Ellen

Wow. Eva Kaminsky is an absolute force and the ovation-worthy knockout of this production. Her Ellen is the kind of performance where you find yourself laughing and then immediately feeling emotional about why you’re so viscerally relating to what she just said. The comedic timing? Impeccable. The emotional depth? Massive. She balances the humor with the anger, hurt, resentment, and hope in a way that feels so real. And her “Mom Mode”? Elite. That hyper-competent “I’ll handle it” energy was so specific and so accurate it genuinely had me thinking back to my childhood and about my own mom just getting things done without fanfare. She builds a gorgeous emotional arc over the course of the play and every single interaction with her scene partners feels grounded. It is a phenomenal performance in a wonderfully written role and she absolutely runs away with it.

The Boy Who Narrates It All: Will Conrad as Joshua

Will Conrad has the responsibility of guiding us through every version of Joshua’s life as both participant and commentator. The transitions between younger and older Joshua are subtle yet distinct without ever feeling gimmicky, and he has a natural ease when breaking the fourth wall that makes the audience feel like co-conspirators in the storytelling. I especially loved the high school play sequence and the college Europe moments, which were both hilarious and incredibly telling in terms of who Joshua is becoming. His chemistry with both Kaminsky and Amy Resnick is warm and believable, and he captures that very specific experience of being a kid watching adult dynamics and trying to decode them years later.

The Matriarch of Memory Lane: Amy Resnick as Renee

Renee is the reason we have the play to begin with, I mean she asks Joshua (Conrad) to write the story of their family with as much vitriol as possible, and Amy Resnick steps into the role with ease. Her work in the scenes where she is younger are especially strong, capturing the vitality and humor that make the character so formidable. The comic exchanges between Renee and Ellen are some of the evening’s most satisfying moments, with both actors volleying beautifully off one another. Their comedic rhythm together is fantastic. As Renee ages, the physical transformation doesn’t always land as organically as the earlier character work, and the very specific accent that’s required for the role comes in and out at times. That said, her comedic instincts are strong and her tether to the family dynamics remains clear throughout the show.

Memory Play Realness

Joshua Harmon continues to be one of my favorite playwrights because he writes roles for actors instead of just characters on a page, and this production is full of performances that understand that. Keira Fromm’s direction keeps the pacing incredibly tight while still allowing the emotional gut punches to breathe, which is not an easy balance in a play that moves through time this fluidly. The scenic design by Courtney O’Neill works beautifully for a memory play, giving us a space that shifts quickly, and the props by Andrew Reynolds add those small, specific details that make each moment. Tyler Micoleau’s lighting does a lot of quiet storytelling work and supports the tonal shifts from comedy to heartbreak seamlessly. 

A Clash That Didn’t Quite Land

In a production that felt so real, the fight toward the end sticks out in a way I don’t think it’s supposed to. For a show that builds so carefully toward its emotional confrontations, this scene felt oddly underpowered. It reads more staged than raw, which takes away from what should and could’ve been a huge moment. Instead of feeling the impact, I found myself pulled out of the scene. Similarly, the wig for older Renee undercuts the realism the production achieves elsewhere. In a show where we move through different time periods, the visual cue of “now she’s old” felt a little costume-y and distracted from the performance.

We Had a Show

I say this every time but Joshua Harmon really is one of the best playwrights of his generation and We Had a World is another example of why. It is sharp, hilarious, poignant and emotionally sneaky in the way it creeps up on you. With powerhouse work from Eva Kaminsky, a beautifully grounded central performance from Will Conrad, strong direction from Keira Fromm, and a design team that understands how to support a memory play without overwhelming it, this is absolutely a knockout for The Huntington. It is the kind of theater that makes you laugh, makes you think about your own family on the walk home, and then makes you want to call your mother. We Had a World runs at The Huntington through March 15, 2026.

📸: Annielly Camargo