Though they were familiar with each other’s work as actors, Brittany Bradford and Emma Ramos had never met before they were cast in the Old Globe’s world-premiere production of “Alien Girls.”
It didn’t take them long to develop chemistry of the kind that BFFs Tiffany and Carolyn share in Amy Berryman’s time-traveling comedy, which opens Saturday in previews at the Balboa Park theater. Their chemistry happened, said Bradford, “as soon as we saw each other.”
“We both love mess. You have to find somebody who feels the same way,” she said.
That somebody would be Ramos, who added “I love bringing bold, crazy choices to the stage. I love chaos. I thrive from chaos.”
Chaos is built into “Alien Girls,” which a year ago was workshopped at the Globe’s Powers New Voices Festival. A staged reading there was directed by Jaki Bradley, who has returned to direct the theatrical premiere in the Sheryl and Harvey White Theatre.
In the story of two writers — pregnant Tiffany (Bradford) and her bestie Carolyn (Ramos) — changes in their lives and in their relationship are dramatic and testing. They’re not only emotional ones but physical.
“This play requires an actor who is able to play an 18-year-old who jumps to a 33-year-old who jumps to a 37-year-old who jumps to an alien form,” said Ramos, not giving away anything more than that.
Actor Emma Ramos, right, watches production stage manager Jo Fernandez demonstrate how to operate one of the puppets that will be featured in the Old Globe’s world premiere of Amy Berryman’s play “Alien Girls.” (Sandy Huffaker)
Fortunately for its two leads (the cast also includes Karina Curet in multiple roles), “We’re both playful people,” Bradford said. “For me, I come in with an open energy and hope I’m with someone else who has an open energy so that we can just jump off each other.
“She (Ramos) is a clown and I am a clown.”
Playwright Berryman, a former actor herself, said that “Alien Girls” is not strictly autobiographical, but “It really came out of something I was experiencing not only within myself but what I was noticing in my friends group, mostly women: these big life changes.”
It’s those changes that characters Tiffany and Carolyn begin to experience that inform “Alien Girls.”
“What happens,” Berryman posed rhetorically, “when some things you assumed about your friendship are going to stay the same forever start to shift? A lot of what is explored in this play is what do you do when you can’t fully be honest about these changes. How do you navigate the challenges of that?”
Director Jaki Bradley gives notes during rehearsals for the Old Globe’s world premiere of Amy Berryman’s play “Alien Girls.” (Sandy Huffaker)
“Alien Girls” is not the first time that Berryman, who recently relocated to the West Coast from New York City, has written about close women and their relationships. Her prior play “Walden,” which premiered five years ago in London, tells the story of two estranged twin sisters on divergent paths in life.
Berryman said the “Alien Girls” that audiences will see now is “pretty similar from what we presented at the workshop last year. That week at the Globe gave me so much information. I did a lot of rewriting that week leading up to the performance. There will be some exciting changes.”
The finished script for “Alien Girls” made an immediate impression on both Bradford and Ramos.
Playwright Amy Berryman is the author of the Old Globe’s world premiere play “Alien Girls.” (Matthew Dunivan)
“It says something so specific about the complexity of female friendship, and within our artistry as well,” Bradford said. “I feel like I’m trying to grapple with a lot of these questions that the character is grappling with. How beautiful and special is it that I get to be in a process that is going to ask those questions?”
Ramos recalled reading the play and “crying over one monologue that felt for me extremely healing and the answer that I was looking for to these constant questions we have as we grow in this life.”
In addition to connecting with their characters that are written as creative artists, Bradford and Ramos are relating to what Berryman is examining about friendship.
“My female friends have ushered me into adulthood and these different stages of my life,” said Bradford, “and have taught me who I am. That is all over this play.”
Ramos agreed. “In every stage of your life with the closest friends around you, your identity molds around that group of people.
“I’m still asking the same questions I was asking when I was 4 years old. I think that the ways in which we connect might change, and there are different tools, but I feel like the essence of a human being is irrefutable.”
Though “Alien Girls” travels through time, Berryman considers it a reflection of today’s society and women in particular.
“The play feels very 21st century,” she said. “Some of the heroics today women are challenged with are those that in my generation were not as readily available to them, like when it comes to having kids or just thinking about whether to have them or not.”
‘Alien Girls’
When: Previews, Saturday through Wednesday. Opens April 23 and runs through May 10. 7 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays
Where:Old Globe Theatre’s Sheryl and Harvey White Theatre, 1363 Old Globe Way, Balboa Park, San Diego
Tickets: $41 and up
Phone: 619-234-5623
Online: theoldglobe.org
Sketches of the alien puppet designs by Helen Q. Huang for the Old Globe’s world premiere of Amy Berryman’s play “Alien Girls.” (Helen Q. Huang)