Lena Waithe Makes Her Playwriting Debut With ‘Trinity’ At Baltimore Center Stage

Lena Waithe has made a name for herself in film and television, but now, she is stepping into a new realm of creativity. On February 12, her first stage play, Trinity, will make its world premiere at Baltimore Center Stage, under the direction of Artistic Director Stevie Walker-Webb, with dramaturg and associate director Avon Haughton helping to shape its development.

The play takes place in a single room where three people move between what’s real and what isn’t, while acting out the moments they are too afraid to confront in their actual lives. The playful dynamic between the show’s primary characters evolves into an examination of intimacy, connection, and the emotional baggage people carry into love, and so much more.

Waithe felt the impulse to write for the stage arrived during a period of self-reflection. “I think I was living life in all its forms as I always do, but at that time I really was trying to understand the lessons that life was trying to teach me,” she said. “Just trying to really understand, ‘What am I supposed to be getting out of this?’ And before I actually completed the lesson, I started writing this play.”

As time passed, Waithe began sending pages to Walker-Webb, who had come to know her through Broadway circles after she became an outspoken champion for Jordan E. Cooper’s Ain’t No Mo’. At the time, he admits he was skeptical. “There’s no way Lena Waithe has time to write a play,” he recalled thinking. But as more pages arrived, Walker-Webb began to see Waithe’s larger vision.

“I was really blown away by it,” he said of the play’s earlier drafts. “It’s probably the most theatrical piece of theater that I’ve worked on since graduate school.” What struck him most was Waithe’s willingness to ignore convention. “She just kept breaking form,” Walker-Webb explained. “It’s a romcom on the surface. It’s existential in its bone marrow, and for some audience members, it might feel like psychological horror.”

While film and television rely heavily on location, the stage allows space to remain fluid. With Trinity, much of the space is suggested rather than shown. Haughton, who has collaborated with Walker-Webb for years, describes Waithe as insatiably curious. Also, bringing the world premiere to Baltimore, rather than New York or Los Angeles, was intentional. Haughton credited his hometown with shaping his identity, and for Waithe, the collaboration felt organic. “Making art here, this is an artistic home for her; there was no making it fit,” he said. “It was just a natural movement.”

The relationship between the play’s director and writer has depended on a real sense of trust. Walker-Webb described a rehearsal room where Waithe occupied multiple vantage points at once. As a writer, he called her rigorous and precise. “Lena will send tweaks and edits 15 times in a day,” he noted. “She’s hungry for the next best draft.” As an actor, he has really seen her talent shine through in more ways than one. “She surprises me often,” he said of her on-stage prowess.

Waithe, for her part, is bracing for opening night. Unlike film and television, there are no retakes. “If it doesn’t go as well as you want it to, it’s okay—on to the next night,” she said. “You just have to honor and own your performance no matter what it was,” the Emmy Award-winner added, calling the craft “therapeutic” at times.

In a career defined by important storytelling, Trinity marks a new chapter. More than anything, it represents a creative leap. As Haughton put it, “Any piece of art worth a damn is always implicating the person perceiving it.” At Baltimore Center Stage, Waithe is testing that proposition, inviting audiences not just to watch, but to see themselves.

Trinity premieres at Baltimore Center Stage February 12 and runs through March 8, 2026.

TOPICS:  Lena Waithe

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