In basketball—and theatre—the stakes are high. Climactic action, movement, and emotion escalate to a fever pitch, causing your heart to pound until the final moments.
Center court will meet center stage in the upcoming West Coast Premiere of Flex, a thrilling play about women hoping to break into the WNBA.
Tipping off at San Francisco Playhouse March 26, Flex is directed by Bay Area theatre titan Margo Hall, who notes, “Basketball has a musicality and strategic precision that feel inherently theatrical. As a director,
I’m fascinated by the choreography of teamwork: the unspoken communication, the shifts in power, the momentum swings. That’s rich dramatic material.”
Set in 1998 just after the formation of the WNBA, Candrice Jones’ riveting new play follows the Lady Train high school basketball team in Plainnole, Arkansas. Dreams of going pro collide with being young, Black, and female in the rural South. The play also follows its teenage protagonists’ adventures (and misadventures) in young love, including two of the players entering a queer relationship. The New York Times called Flex’s Off-Broadway run at Lincoln Center Theater “a slam-dunk.” The New York Sun proclaimed, “Poignant and humorous, Flex is infused with such a generous, buoyant spirit, you can’t help being uplifted by it.”
While basketball is central to Flex, the play also explores the lives of its young Black female characters and their rich relationships as a team. “What excites me most about Flex is its fierce celebration of Black girls in all their complexity: their ambition, tenderness, competitiveness, and vulnerability,” said Hall. “We so rarely get to see young Black women centered in stories about athletic excellence and interior emotional lives at the same time. Candrice Jones writes these girls with humor, heat, and heart. That combination is what makes theatre extraordinary.”
“In Flex, the journey of this Black girls’ basketball team to the state finals is thrilling,” adds Artistic Director Bill English. “But what moves us most is the humanity behind the scoreboard—the humor, tenderness, and fierce loyalty that propel them forward. Flex celebrates young women discovering who they are and who they might become.”
A former cheerleader, Hall had a front row seat on the action and was deeply invested in the teams she supported. “That experience gave me a real appreciation for the discipline, camaraderie, and emotional intensity of sports,” said Hall.
Hall works with her husband, Emmanuel Blackwell, as the basketball consultant for this production, in which vital scenes hinge on players scoring (or not). For Hall and Blackwell, the basketball is dramaturgy, not decoration. “Manny has been coaching basketball for over 45 years, so authenticity is key,” said Hall. “The drills, the footwork, the physical conditioning—all of it must feel earned. We’re also shaping the movement language to support character development and emotional stakes. The audience should feel the pressure of the clock, the physical exhaustion, and the adrenaline of the moment.”
The all-female cast of this action-packed new play includes Bay Area theatre veteran Halili Knox as the team’s coach, a role she’s been instrumental in developing, appearing in the early readings, the World Premiere, and Off-Broadway at Lincoln Center Theater. The basketball team is portrayed onstage by Courtney Gabrielle Williams, Santeon Brown, Paige Mayes, Emma Gardner, and Camille Collaço.
As audiences see the Lady Train take the stage, Hall hopes their stories resonate. “I hope audiences witness the complexity and brilliance of these young women. I hope they understand the weight of what it means to be talented and young, and to be aware that opportunity is limited. And I hope they leave thinking about how we invest in—and protect—the dreams of Black girls.”
Flex will perform March 26–May 2, 2026, at the San Francisco Playhouse, 450 Post Street. Tickets are available at https://sfplayhouse.org/
Arts & Entertainment
Published on March 12, 2026
Recent Comments