A benefit fundraiser performance
"Layton gave the performance of the festival by embodying with ease all these many disparate characters and making them all flesh and blood people. It's a solid showcase for an excellent actor"
- Michael Glitz, Huffington Post
MAGDALEN, a Best of FringeNYC solo performance performed by critically acclaimed New York City actor/playwright and producer, Erin Layton and directed by Julie Kline, traces the lives of four girls and women who were deemed "fallen" by the Irish Catholic Church and incarcerated in a commercial Magdalene Laundry in Dublin, Ireland where they are told they can "wash away their sins" as "penitent" workers to the nuns in the mid-1940s. In this engaging solo show drama, Layton swiftly transitions in and out of time periods between modern day and mid-twentieth century Ireland while portraying all four laborers, the church authorities and the voice of Irish society, a male character who runs a youth hostel for addicts in Dublin.
"This intriguing yet disturbing story is devised and performed by Erin Layton with skill and integrity. Her movement and expression create images and characters that breed anger, compassion, sorrow and mistrust. Their impressions are capable of raising repressed feelings and unanswered questions regardless of religious affiliation. Her performance is exact, sincere and riveting"
- Joseph Verlezza, Theatre Reviews Limited.
