Theatre for Health Care Professionals and for the Public

Theater for Health Care Professionals: STAGING LOSS, Talking About What We Do Not Talk About
Conceived and Produced by: Matthew Loscalzo, Daniella Topol, Linda Klein
Script Adaptation: Daniella Topol, Winter Miller
Directed by: Jennifer Chambers

The health of our communities depends on the well-being of those who care for them. Yet across the healthcare system, professionals at every level are navigating burnout, moral injury, and compassion fatigue—often while carrying the unspoken weight of personal and professional loss. Staging Loss is an interactive, creative theatrical experience that invites open, courageous dialogue around these often-silenced experiences. Rooted in the belief that healthcare must honor the dignity, values, and humanity of all people — patients and clinicians alike — this session offers a space for reflection, connection, and healing. 

Taken verbatim from Loss and Grief: Personal Stories of Doctors and Other Healthcare Professionals (Oxford University Press, 2023), professional actors dramatize raw and unflinching essays of personal loss, many written by a diverse group of internationally recognized healthcare professionals: Craig Blinderman, Susan D. Block, Marshall Forstein, Mitch Golant, John Halporn, Wendy S. Harpham, Linda A. Klein, Cheryl Krauter, Matthew Loscalzo, Damon Madison, Joan Heller Miller, Ken Miller, Steven T. Rosen, Julia H. Rowland, Lidia Schapira, Amy N. Ship, Joseph V. Simone, Patricia Ann Sheahan Simone, Cy A. Stein and Fredda Wasserman. These leaders are, or were, affiliated with the world’s top healthcare institutions, including City of Hope, Columbia, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Memorial Sloan Kettering, the National Cancer Institute, St. Jude’s, Stanford and Yale.

Through storytelling and shared insight, participants explore how tending to our own grief can strengthen our capacity to care for others, and how humanistic care begins with empathy—for ourselves and each other.  Join us as we make space for what is difficult—and discover what becomes possible when we do.     

Staging Loss has been presented at City of Hope (September 2024), and the APOS Conference (March 2025) and will be presented at the Gold Humanism Summit in September 2025. To find out more about this, please email: dt2795@cumc.columbia.edu.

Professional Theatre Experience (for the General Public)

The Gett
By Liba Vaynberg
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Rattlestick Theatre

Novenas for a Lost Hospital
By Cusi Cram
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Rattlestick Theatre

When January Feels Like Summer
By Cori Thomas
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Ensemble Studio Theatre and P73, NYC
Remounted by Ensemble Studio Theatre and Women’s Project, NYC

Ironbound
By Martyna Major
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Steppenwolf’s First Look Series, IL, Women's Project/Rattlestick (NYC) and Roundhouse Theater (MD)

Five Mile Lake
By Rachel Bonds
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by South Coast Rep, CA

Row After Row
By Jessica Dickey
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by the Women’s Project Theater

Wind In The Willows
Music by Mike Reid
Lyrics by Sarah Schlesinger  
Book by Mindi Dickstein
Based on the novel by Kenneth Grahame
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Two River Theatre

Charles Ives Take Me Home
By Jessica Dickey
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Rattlestick Theater

Jesus In India
By Lloyd Suh
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Magic Theatre, SF and MaYi Theatre, NYC

Andy and the Shadows
By Ari Roth
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Theatre J, DC

Electric Baby
By Stefanie Zadravec
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Quantum Theatre

Monster at the Door
By Rajiv Joseph
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by The Alley Theatre, Houston, TX

How The World Began
By Catherine Treischmann
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Women's Project, NYC

Photograph 51
By Anna Ziegler
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Theatre J, Washington D.C.

The Morini Strad
By Willy Holtzman
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by City Theatre, Pittsburgh, PA

Pool Boy
Music and Lyrics by Nikos Tsakalakos
Book and Lyrics by Janet Allard
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Barrington Stage Company

Lascivious Something
By Sheila Callaghan
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by the Women's Project and Productions in Association with Cherry Lane Theatre

Sarita
By Maria Irene Fornes
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced as part of the 2009/2010 Mainstage Season at Fordham College at Lincoln Center, Matthew Maguire, Theatre Department Chair.

Stretch: A Fantasia
By Susan Bernfield
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by People's Light and Theatre Company

Tender
By Nicki Bloom
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced at the Public Theater as part of the Summer Play Festival 2009

Night Sky
By Susan Yankowitz
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Power Productions New York, Inc. & The National Aphasia Association at The Baruch Performing Arts Center

Carol And Jill
By Leslie Ayvazian
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced as part of the Ensemble Studio Theatre's Marathon 2009

Instructions For Breathing
By Caridad Svich
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by the Passage Theatre Company

Housebreaking
By Jakob Holder
Mentored by Chuck Mee
Directed by Daniella Topol
Part of the 2009 Cherry Lane Mentor Project

Forgetting
By Trista Baldwin
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by the Workhaus Collective in Minneapolis, MN

Little Women
Music by Kim Oler
Lyrics  by Alison Hubbard
Book by Sean Hartley
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by the Village Theatre in Seattle, WA

Palace Of The End
By Judith Thompson
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Epic Theatre Ensemble at The Peter Jay Sharp Theatre at Playwrights Horizons

Sand
By Trista Baldwin
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by the Women's Project

Dead City
By Sheila Callaghan
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by New Georges

Snow Queen
By Stanton Wood
Directed by Daniella Topol
Produced by Urban Stages

Tiny Feats of Cowardice
By Susan Bernfield and Rachel Peters
Directed by Daniella Topol