You Got Older – 25 March 2026

A boldly intrepid endeavor, You Got Older is a character study about Mae (Alia Shawkat), a young woman caught in the middle of a complex web of desires and expectations. Mae struggles with giving her whole heart’s worth of kindness and feeling like she doesn’t deserve to receive it in return. Her tenderness and gentleness in scenes with her family is deeply touching, yet playwright Clare Barron juxtaposes these interactions with Mae’s sexual fantasies involving a rough night with a handsome cowboy (Paul Cooper). These moments of fantasy reflect Mae’s desire for clarity and for someone else to take the reins so that she doesn’t have to be a full time caretaker. Mae is highly relatable, as she sits on the brink of wanting to be alone but not wanting to be lonely.

The storytelling strategies in You Got Older are exceptional. Expertly maneuvering between fact and fantasy, the script takes its time with uncomfortable moments and the pressure they bring. The script itself is tight, but it speaks to the messiness of life with an accuracy that poignantly rings true for the audience. Mae is trying to process grief before her father (Peter Friedman) has died, and make sense of the ease with which her siblings, Matthew (Misha Brooks), Hannah (Nadine Maloof), and Jenny (Nina White) make decisive decisions about their lives. Mae seems a little left behind—the one who has to build a new life and make a decision about where she wants that life to be—while others have definitive places to be and people to be with. Alia Shawkat’s maneuvering of Mae’s emotions is a careful balancing act, because even though Mae is portrayed as someone in the middle of a transition, she still has moments of assertive confidence, particularly with Mac (Caleb Joshua Eberhardt) and her father. Shawkat.’s performance gives dignity to people who are unsure of where they’re headed by fully fleshing out this character as someone who experiences desire, impulses, longing, and human connection. She is not withdrawn and hiding.

You Got Older ends with a celebration in which the four siblings jump and dance through the entirety of Pitbull and Ke$ha’s “Timber”. It is an expression of joy that is unprecedented within the confines of this work. This ending is unexpected, and it’s full of life in a way that reminds the audience that people get through tough moments and that nothing is forever. It sends an important message: even as you get older, there are still sincere moments of joy in your future.

I attended this performance on a press pass from Print Shop PR.