July 3, 2026

Epstein Oratorio or, A Modern Hymn to Demeter

Karen Malpede | Kathleen Chalfant

October 1-2, 2026

7:00pm

Ellen Stewart Theatre
66 East 4th Street (between Bowery and Second Avenue)
New York, NY 10003

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Runtime: 50 minutes

A Benefit Reading to Support the Public Integrity Project Suing for the Release of the Epstein Files.

This short poetic, terrifying, and funny political play is an expose of the “Epstein class” played out against the iconic mother-daughter myth of Persephone and Demeter.

Hades presides over both modern and mythic worlds, and a male chorus speaks in language that has been lifted directly from the Epstein files and the news. The victims’ stories are based on actual stories in the files. The weave of myth and fact offers a healing from the trauma of rape by the empowerment of mothers and daughters.

Credits

CAST

Kathleen Chalfant

Phoebe Chaplin

Stella Everett

Robert Farrior

Tu Morrow

Delilah Napier

Barney O’Hanlon

Lena Pepe

Roger Raines

Titus Welliver

Christen Clifford

Creative Team

Karen Malpede, playwright

Alex Keegan, director

lighting by Tony Giovannetti

Epstein Oratorio benefit reading producers: Karen Brooks, Michal Gamily, Julianne Hoffenberg, Evangeline Morphos

Additional credits

photos by Jackie Rudin, Salem Krieger,
and Ellen Lynch

cover of the book, published by Tough Poets Review, artwork by Marie Louise Plum

The Artists

Karen Malpede

bio

Karen Malpede (Playwright) is an award-winning playwright of 23 plays on pressing social and political subjects, including The Beekeeper’s Daughter, Prophecy, Another Life, Extreme Whether, and I Will Bear Witness (Obie Award). In 1995, she co-founded Theater Three Collaborative. Her plays are published across three collections, and her latest work, Epstein Oratorio or, A Modern Hymn to Demeter, was recently published by Tough Poets Review. Her memoir, Last Radiance: Radical Lives, Bright Deaths, covers her life in the downtown avant-garde.

Kathleen Chalfant

bio

Kathleen Chalfant (Demeter) is a Tony- and Drama Desk-nominated actress whose notable stage credits include Angels in America, Wit, Racing Demon, and Tales from Red Vienna. Her extensive screen work includes recurring roles on The Affair, The Americans, and House of Cards, as well as the film Familiar Touch, for which she won Best Actress in the Horizon competition at the 2024 Venice Film Festival. She is a recipient of multiple Obie Awards, including a 2018 Obie Award for Lifetime Achievement.