Caroline – the much-discussed new Off-Broadway play by Columbia College Chicago Theatre alum Preston Max Allen ’13, a graduate of the Columbia College Theatre Program’s BA Program in Acting – officially opened September 30 in its world premiere at New York City’s MCC Theater – and the reviews are rolling in, reports the theatre news site Playbill.

On opening night, it was announced that the play was extending its Off-Broadway world premiere engagement for a second time, Playbill reports. The production, which began previews September 13 at MCC’s Susan & Ronald Frankel Theater, was originally scheduled to conclude October 19. First extended through November 2, the production will now run through November 16. For tickets, click here.

Caroline is directed by former Columbia College Chicago Theatre Program student and faculty member and Columbia College Honorary Degree recipient David Cromer HDR ’17, winner of the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical for the Broadway hit The Band’s Visit in 2018. As previously reported in this blog, Cromer received an Honorary Doctorate of Arts from Columbia College when he spoke at the school’s commencement ceremony in 2017 – the same year he won the Obie Award for directing The Band’s Visit‘s world premiere off-Broadway prior to its Broadway production. Cromer’s other New York directing credits include the 2025 Broadway hit Good Night, and Good Luck, starring and cowritten by George Clooney, which made history by becoming the highest-grossing play in Broadway history and also by being the first Broadway play ever broadcast live in performance for free on TV. Cromer’s New York credits also include off-Broadway productions of the classic American drama Our Town and the musical Adding Machine, for both of which he won Obie Awards for his direction. And in Chicago, Cromer won Joseph Jefferson Awards – Chicago theatre’s top prize – for his direction of productions of Our Town, Cider House Rules, The Price, and Angels in America.

As previously reported in this blog, Allen is the author of the musical We Are the Tigers, which enjoyed a 2019 Off-Broadway run and is available for production through Broadway Licensing Global, which licenses rights to more than 8,000 plays and musicals for professional and non-professional productions around the world. In 2024, Allen was honored by Chicago’s LGBT news site Windy City Times as one of its “30 Under 30” award winners. Allen’s new play Modern Gentleman will be produced by Chicago’s About Face Theatre in March 2026.

Caroline stars Chloë Grace Moretz as Maddie, the mother of a 9-year-old transgender daughter, Caroline, played by child actor River Lipe-Smith. Amy Landecker completes the cast as Maddie’s long-estranged mother.

In an interview with Vogue, Moretz said: “I think this play deals with a lot of themes that are incredibly important right now. There are obviously the dynamics of three generations of women, but then slowly you start to peel back the layers of what Caroline is going through, and the element of her mother’s addiction and sobriety. I definitely love a project that tears your heart out and stomps on it a little bit, but then lifts you back up. . . . Preston has such a strong point of view and is such a beautiful and specific writer. . . . I think the best form of art takes a strong stance, and this is a play that takes a strong stance. And I think that with what’s going on, not just in our country, but in multiple countries across the world right now, there’s a silencing of trans creators, gay creators, and queer creators in general. I think you should be taking a stance with the art you make. It’s been really wonderful to see responses from people that might not have ever been a part of trans people’s lives, and they get to step in for an hour and 26 minutes and hear dialogue and witness all of us existing. And it just is—the normalcy of that. That’s what I love so much about what Preston wrote in this play, is that there is a lot of really intense fighting that goes on, and none of it is about whether or not Caroline is who Caroline is. There’s no misgendering. Caroline is Caroline, and no one questions that. The normalcy of Caroline being Caroline is what I think is so poignant and is what you don’t expect going in—which I think is a stance.”

Says the review in TimeOut: “Three generations of women navigate intense, complex mother-daughter bonds in Caroline, an alternately quiet and explosive drama by Preston Max Allen.” The New York Times‘ review of Caroline calls the show “an intimate, closely observed play with astute things to say about transgender identity and acceptance, but also about addiction, recovery, wealth, class, family dynamics and the uphill climb it can be to lead a scrupulously honest life.”

“There are some plays which foster such a degree of intimacy that you feel like you’re eavesdropping on private interactions rather than watching a performance,” says the critic for New York Stage Review. “Caroline is the sort of small-scale family drama that packs a big emotional punch. Much of that is due to the outstanding performances and the pitch-perfect direction by David Cromer, [who] orchestrates the quiet proceedings with the emotional delicacy that is his trademark.” Says the review in 1 Minute Critic: “Cromer . . . has a knack for extracting a kind of distilled specificity from his actors, and this trifecta rises to the occasion.”

“This is an absorbing play of fragments, absences, estrangements, and endurance. In its raw, concentrated authenticity, Caroline shows us that survival emerges not from traditional mainstream institutional support or the illusion of suburban safety, but from small acts of persistence like a handmade bracelet, a passionate promise, a chosen name spoken aloud,” says the reviewer for Talkin’ Broadway. “Allen’s absorbing new domestic drama . . . skillfully raises issues about whether we can truly make amends for our past mistakes — or rebuild our trust in those who have betrayed it,” says the critic for Culture Sauce.

“Three generations of a fractured family come together in Preston Max Allen’s richly emotional drama,” says New York Theatre Guide, adding, “Allen, an emerging writer, displays a fine-tuned ear for dialogue. Quiet heart-to-hearts and jagged arguments emerge true to life.” And The Wrap calls Caroline “one of the best new plays to open this year.”