Global Theatre Performance Series: "Hell Has an Exit: Finding Freedom Behind Bars"
Date: 02-06-2026
Time: 07:00 PM
Location: Quick Center for the Arts
Friday, February 6 at 7:00 p.m. the Global Theatre Performance Series presents Hell Has an Exit: Finding Freedom Behind Bars. Fairfield University and Prep Faculty and Staff enjoy one free ticket to each event. Additional discounts are available for guest tickets. Fairfield University students can enjoy free tickets when faculty send their class list to the Quick Center Box Office at quickboxoffice@fairfield.edu.
On the 250th anniversary of our nation’s birth, and this being the 10th year of the Global Theatre: Performance Series, we choose to revisit and refocus the lens on one of the plays we produced within the last decade.
In 2023 we produced Surviving Troubled Waters: From Prison to Freedom through Music. We told the stories of two women, BL Shirelle and Naomi Wilson, incarcerated for a total of 37 years in Pennsylvania. They had a close bond and a shared connection in prison and through their music. A bond that was very much like a mother and daughter relationship.
Like last year’s play our protagonist’s journey to redemption is framed by Dante’s journey out of hell to heaven.
This time we focus on the actual mother-daughter relationship of BL Shirelle and her mother, Debra Taylor, both having had a difficult beginning, each a drug user and drug dealer. Through their incarceration and very complicated relationship they have made it through difficult times. Debra is now the pastor of her church with an ever-expanding membership and BL is an accomplished musician, producer, and songwriter.
How did this happen? What are their stories? And, what is their relationship today? What lessons can we learn from both of them?
This is a play about a mother-daughter relationship from trauma to hope and redemption.
They are champions of the American Experiment – America250: The Promise and Paradox.
Related Web Site : https://quickcenter.fairfield.edu/2025-26-season-calendar/theatre/surviving-troubled-waters.html
For more information, contact Quick Center Box Office / 203-254-4010 / quickboxoffice@fairfield.edu