A new original play

Dearest,

Written by Noah Dehli. Devised and performed by Andrew Cooper, Noah Dehli, and Ada Green.

Dearest, (comma included) is a play about an engaged couple. They are not in love, but lots of people think they should be. Maybe they even think they should be.

Also, it happens in England in the 1850s, which is pretty cool.

Statement

Artistic Statement

Dearest, conjures a storm between compromise and privilege: Anne and Peter’s problems are objectively few, but their pain feels visceral, and their problems immediate; the pair tries to make the best of a bad situation and maybe that’s enough for us to sympathize. Against the colorful backdrop of a simultaneously forgiving and exacting world, beauty shares a thin line with destruction and carnality. The play asks us, as nature and biology clash with our social constructs, what happens if you can’t love the person you care about more than anyone else?

Before this show was a show, it was four hours of improv on a couch. Last summer, the three actors in this debut production sat on that couch. With very little preparation, other than some intention of making art together and having some Elizabethan-era accent fun, we found some brilliant stuff: a world with strong parallels to modern gender expression and patriarchal ideals, excess, sweetness, and a relationship with the grotesque. Since then, the character’s names have changed and the concept has bloomed, but the core has remained constant.

Artists

Meet the artists

We don't bite most of the time!

Add Andrew’s photo

Andrew Cooper

Replace this with Andrew’s bio. Andrew helped devise and performs in Dearest,.

Noah Dehli

Noah Dehli (he/him) is an actor, director, and writer. He is a junior majoring in Theater Studies at Stanford University; credits include Stanford Music Dpt.’s Into the Woods (Baker), mainstage Witch (Understudy, Fight Captain), Stanford Light Opera Company’s Hunchback (Phoebus), Stanford Theater Lab’s student-written play Come Again (Director, Set Designer, Intimacy Coordinator), capstone production Port Pourri (Set Designer), Asian American Theater Project’s Cabaret (Bobby, Fight Choreographer), and mainstage Romeo and Juliet (Mercutio). He also wrote this play. Additionally, he wants to thank Ada and Andrew for their immense love and support AND for putting up with Noah's bullshit.

Ada Green

Ada (she/her) is super duper psyched to be performing in Dearest, with two of her favorite people. She is currently studying theatre and creative writing at Northwestern University where she most recently played Betty in Vinegar Tom. Before college, Ada was a company member at LightsUp! Theatre Company for six years; favorite credits include Orpheus in Hadestown, Matilda in Matilda, and Miranda in The Tempest. In May of 2025, she directed, co-wrote, and performed in The Sarah House Journals, a collaboration between Laguna Blanca School and Sarah House Santa Barbara to raise money for the hospice home. Gratitude to her parents, silly little brother Cooper, and Noah and Andrew.