Mother Russia Tickets

See the newest comedy from Lauren Yee. The second work in her Signature residency, Yee's Mother Russia plays for a limited run this winter at the Pershing Square Signature Center. Yee is ”a playwright of great heart and audacity to match” (The New York Times) and made a name for herself with the 2020 New York premiere of Cambodian Rock Band. Now, she has a new comedy: the sly and transfixing Mother Russia.

See Mother Russia off Broadway, in which Yee uses humor to explore the aftermath of tyranny. Set in St. Petersburg in 1992, Mother Russia follows two men — and the former dissident musician they’re surveilling — adjusting to the new regime of capitalism: its liberties, its riches of supermarket options, and gratifying fast food. Yes, McDonald's plays a role in this comedy about capitalism's ability to commodify pretty much anything.

Evgeny, a young man at a loss, stumbles into a job working surveillance with his friend Dmitri. Their target: Katya, a former pop singer with questionable allegiances and a mysterious past. Learning more about Katya, Evgeny soon falls in love, leaving all grappling with the taste of freedom — and a hunger for fast food — in this New York premiere and razor-sharp dark comedy.

Prior to the pandemic, Yee was named by American Theatre as the second-most produced playwright of that upcoming season. Heather Christian, with Oratorio for Living Things, is also a part of Signature's new season, and together Christian and Lee are writing the musical adaptation of Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time. Yee is the winner of a Doris Duke Artists Award, Whiting Award, American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, Horton Foote Prize, and Kesselring Prize.