PERFECT LOVE
it must be out there somewhere
​​written and performed by Linda Manning
​
a modern coming of age story exploring love, lust, betrayal and brutality

Dixon Place - April 2019

Why does a woman with a loving husband and two kids suddenly find herself unbearably anxious, unable to sleep, and her only comfort an old poster of Robert Redford?

directed by Gretchen Cryer
with original music by Jono Hill

What people are saying:
"I was completely immersed!!"
"Wonderful writing and beautifully performed. When you screamed 'Mom,' I froze!" 
"I loved the shifts between young you, adolescent you, and grown up you." 
"Very powerful. And so honest. Really amazing!"
"​You knocked me flat and lifted me back up!!!"

Linda speaks out about her past, her evolution from a rootless girl surrounded by predatory, abusive men to a reckless woman on the hunt for perfect love with every sexy, dangerous man she meets. ​

Content Warning: sexual assault

---

​How does a young girl, young woman, get the idea in her head that such a thing exists: perfect love?

What risks does she take to find it ...

And why does it take decades
to tell the truth about what happened ...

---

Review from Maureen Payne-Hahner, WIN Writers Innovative Network NYC/London
"This world is full with brave and honest performances, but not quite like this.
It was the sheer force of her work, her truth-telling, her deep dive into the known --
and not knowing how she might resurface that made us feel
all the things we needed to feel."
​
Review from TheatreReview.NYC
"Nothing is off limits here ...
She relishes in the telling of her tale. Her words are courageous and
​her performance is revelatory and joyous to watch."

Follow Linda:

• Linda began developing Perfect Love in Gretchen Cryer's Solo Show workshop at The Dramatists Guild Institute in 2017.
• Perfect Love debuted at the United Solo Festival in NYC in September, 2018 to a sold out house.
• DixonPlace.org presented the show in April, 2019 -- another sold out performance.

Linda Manning is a playwright, screenwriter, and actor. She has written five full length plays: Bite the Apple (2019 Finalist for the Kentucky Women Writers Prize), staged reading at TheaterLab NYC 2016, produced as part of the NY Int’l Fringe Festival, 2012; There Is No You and Me, staged reading produced by The Drawing Board in NYC 2018; GUY (semi-finalist for the O'Neill National Playwriting Conference 2007); DO SOMETHING WITH YOURSELF! The Life of Charlotte Brontë produced by The Invisible Theatre, NYC and published by Smith and Kraus; adaptation of The Fall of the House of Usher produced by The Invisible Theatre, NYC.
 
Linda has co-written and acted in two short films. Wake Up premiered at the 48 Hour Film Project, New Haven and Linda won Best Actress at the festival. Her short film, Ghost Ride, premiered at the 2016 New York Short Film Festival and the 2017 Manhattan Film Festival. Linda has written three full length screenplays: Learning to Drive (Grand Prize in the 2013 StoryPros Awards Screenplay Contest), Charlotte (second round of competition for the 2016 Sundance Screenwriters Lab), and Divine Food.
 
She was a founding member of The Invisible Theatre in New York City. Linda received a Ledig House International Writers' Colony Fellowship, won Third Prize in the Center Theatre International Playwriting Contest, Chicago, IL, and Third Prize in the Great Platte River Playwrights' Festival, Univ. of Nebraska. Her work was a finalist in the Robert J. Pickering Award for Playwriting Excellence, Coldwater, MI, and a finalist in the South Carolina Playwrights' Festival, Trustus Theatre, Columbia, SC. She also won the Jane Chambers Playwriting Graduate Student Award. 
 
Linda has had featured roles in independent feature films, Mermaid Parade, Mina Martin, Subways, and The Breeding, and has acted in numerous theater productions in New York and regionally. Linda has worked as a teaching artist for Red Bull Theatre, Hour Children, Horace Mann School, and in NYC public schools. She has also taught master classes in screenwriting through the Bronx Council on the Arts. Linda has a Masters Degree from Trinity Rep Conservatory in Providence, Rhode Island, and a Bachelors from the University of Colorado, Denver. 

LindaSManning.com

---