British playwright Lucy Kirkwood’s “The Welkin” concludes the 2024-25 season of the School of Drama. Sally Poppy’s pregnancy — if true — would save her from a death sentence for having committed a murder. The jury, composed of “matrons” – women who have given birth themselves – deliberates while a mob screams and threatens outside.

But it’s not all grim and grimy. There’s humor in the proceedings, as well. And the play’s title, an archaic word for the heavenly firmament, plays on the time of the trial, as rural England awaits the appearance of Halley’s Comet. Drama directing alum Acadia Barrengos returns to direct the play, which is described as "a wise, funny, richly intelligent and generously ambitious play that asks, as all good history plays do, how far have we really come?” (Financial Times)