Wolf Play is the queer theatre event of the year. Check out our review and opening night pictures!
Some productions entertain, and then some productions quietly rewire something in you as you watch them. Wolf Play, now on at The Court Theatre’s Wakefield Family Front Room, belongs firmly in the latter category. It is one of the most engrossing, emotionally precise pieces of theatre to hit a New Zealand stage in recent years. This is a bold, mischievous, and deeply human exploration of love, chosen family, and the untidy edges of belonging.
Directed with remarkable clarity by Kathleen Burns, Hansol Jung’s script — already a critical darling internationally, earning a Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play — is honoured here with a production that understands the delicate chaos at its heart. The premise is shocking in its simplicity: a boy is “un-adopted” online by an American father and handed off like a second-hand object. But under Burns’ direction, this is not played for melodrama. It is played for truth, with a theatrical inventiveness that keeps the audience leaning forward, breath held.
At the centre of it all is Wolf, the ‘un-adopted boy’, realised not by a child actor but by a puppet. In lesser hands, this could be a distancing device. Instead, Reylene Rose Hilaga delivers the production’s most luminous performance, breathing startling life into the role. With exuberant physicality and remarkable emotional sensitivity, Hilaga navigates the dual challenge of puppeteering and character work with astonishing finesse.
They don’t just operate the puppet; they translate the child’s inner world for the audience, allowing Wolf’s innocence and longing to shine through with heartbreaking clarity. There are moments when the puppet shifts, or looks up, or recoils — and you feel it instinctively in your chest. Hilaga’s work is electric, playful, and profoundly empathetic.
The surrounding ensemble is uniformly strong. Emily Katene as Robin is heartbreakingly sincere. She vibrates with the desperate hope of someone who wants to be a mother so badly it pulses out of her, fierce and glowing.
Poet Ray Shipley, in their acting debut as Ash, is nothing short of revelatory. Known to many as a sharp wit with a spoken-word cadence, Shipley brings a disarming authenticity to the role. Their Ash is brittle and brave all at once: a boxer whose toughest fight is not in a ring, but in the messy, terrifying vulnerability of parenting. It’s an extraordinary first turn on stage, grounded in emotional intelligence.
Nic Kyle brings a quietly compelling tension as Ryan. Andrew Todd, as Peter, finds the unsettling humanity in a character who could easily be reduced to villainy. Instead, the production avoids simple binaries. This decision gives the piece its spine.
Visually and tonally, Wolf Play is a triumph of controlled imagination. Wolves, boxing, digital-era adoption, family politics — it shouldn’t cohere, but it does. Burns’ direction balances playfulness with precision, allowing moments of humour to pierce through before the emotional blow lands. The result is thrilling theatre.
Wolf Play is fierce, lyrical, and unflinchingly fresh. It sinks its teeth in and doesn’t let go. But perhaps more importantly, it invites you to consider who you call family and what it means to protect your own.
WOLF PLAY will be performed The Court Theatre until Saturday 22 November. Book tickets here.
