A young couple, Jenny and Elias, arrive late one evening at Mertis Graven’s bed and breakfast in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania – historic site of a terrible Civil War battle. They are trying to get over some history of their own. Each is prickly and easily feels the other’s stings. Perhaps in this comfortable home surrounded by dolls, knick-knacks and Mertis’ blind and eccentric friend Genevieve, they can find peace with each other. But the past can be a kind of haunting, where rooms are temperamental and you never know what objects are thinking.

Over the past decade, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Annie Baker has found poetry in extraordinary dialogue and ultra-ordinary situations. In her latest highly acclaimed play John she splashes a liberal measure of Gothic eeriness into the pot.

Having introduced Melbourne audiences to Baker’s work with her ground-breaking Circle Mirror Transformation in the Lawler a few years ago, MTC is delighted for the opportunity to present this stunning new drama directed by Sarah Goodes. As Mertis, the incomparable Helen Morse (The Aunt’s Story, Frozen) returns to the stage, as does MTC favourite Julia Blake (The Crucible), with Johnny Carr (What Rhymes with Cars and Girls) and, making her Company debut, Ursula Mills.