About 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche by Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood:

5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche is a tenderhearted but raucous comedy set in 1956. The “widows” of the Susan B. Anthony Society for the Sisters of Gertrude Stein are gathered for their annual quiche breakfast when atomic bomb sirens sound. Has the Communist threat finally come to pass? As their idyllic town and carefully constructed world begins to crumble, secrets emerge and the women wrestle with hysteria, survival, and a fate worse than death: a world without quiche!

Our Story:

In February 2024, five actresses came together at Nutley Little Theatre in Nutley, New Jersey to perform in the comedy 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche by Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood. The show was ostensibly a success: The show won the 2024 Perry Award for Best Play, one of the top honors in New Jersey community theatre, and Danielle Levitt received a Best Actress nomination. What none of us expected, though, was how special that production would become, onstage and off. The most meaningful part was the bond we formed as a cast. After the run ended, we stayed close friends and kept talking about the magic of that show. Eventually, someone said the thing that felt a little bit crazy: What if we took this show to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival?

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the largest performing arts festival in the world: a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for many artists. We’re raising funds to cover the travel and production costs that will allow this New Jersey-born production to perform at the world’s largest arts festival. None of us have ever produced something on that scale or taken a show overseas. We’re not backed by a major company; we’re just five community theatre artists from New Jersey who loved a show and decided to take a leap. So we created Cheese Platter Productions to bring this award-winning production to Scotland. Four members of the original cast, Sinead Kerr of Bayonne, Kayla Torres of Nutley, Danielle Levitt of Westfield, and Jessa Blackthorne of Carlstadt, will reprise their roles, joined by Mia Jacobs of Caldwell. Jessa will direct, with Kayla as Assistant Director, as we reimagine the show for an international audience.

This journey is deeply rooted in the New Jersey community theatre world that helped us grow as performers. Every rehearsal space, volunteer, and audience member has made this possible. Anyone who has ever painted a set at midnight, sewn a last-minute costume piece, or worked a light board for a show knows how much heart goes into community theatre. We’re proud to represent NJ community theatre on an international stage.

There’s also a special full-circle moment: Sinead Kerr is a Scotland native and former Olympic ice dancer. Bringing this production to Scotland means returning to her home country in a new way, as part of a small theatre company formed through friendship and creativity.

Making this dream possible is expensive. Traveling overseas with a cast and production requires funding for airfare, housing, festival registration, venue costs, rehearsal space, technical equipment, and marketing. As a grassroots production, we are entirely self-funded and are relying on our community’s support to make this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity possible.

Your donation will help bring a homegrown New Jersey production to one of the world’s biggest stages. Whether you’re part of the NJ theatre community, someone who believes in grassroots art, or a supporter of Sinead from her skating career, we would be incredibly grateful for your support. Every donation helps, and every share helps even more to make this dream come true. Thank you for helping a group of determined community theatre artists take a leap and bring a little bit of New Jersey (and a LOT of quiche) to Scotland.

- The Cast of 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche, Cheese Platter Productions