By Shawn Maus
Lisa Marie White’s S.A.G. begins with four ghosts trapped in the attic of an historic property, waiting for their cue to frighten the paying customers downstairs.
Then a newly dead Hollywood actress arrives and asks the question that has apparently gone unasked for decades:
Why aren’t the ghosts unionized?
From there, the jokes come fast. Then faster. By the time the 52-minute staged reading ended, I had written “FUNNY, FUNNY, FUNNY” in my notebook and underlined it.
I wanted more.
Not because the play felt slow or unfinished. Quite the opposite. It moves so quickly and lands so many jokes that another 15 or 20 minutes would give the audience more time with these characters and allow White to dig further into the histories hiding underneath the comedy.
Welcome to the Worst Job in the Afterlife
Violet and Sam have spent years performing their assigned haunting duties in the attic of a historic property. Then Chester arrives and gets the kind of employee training no one expects after death.
And then comes Madison, a freshly deceased actress who arrives with Hollywood confidence, workplace complaints and the dangerous idea that eternity ought to come with better working conditions.
White’s comedy has the snap of an old Moss Hart play and the rapid-fire setup-and-punchline structure of a very good sitcom. The jokes do not arrive alone. They bring friends, cut in line and keep coming before the last laugh has finished.
The best part is that the play never acts embarrassed about wanting to be funny. It does not pause to lecture the audience or prove how important it is. It trusts laughter. That trust feels almost rebellious right now.
How to Keep the Dead Alive
Comedy can die on the page when the timing is off by half a beat. Director Linda Callahan never lets that happen.
Even in a staged reading, she finds the pace, pauses and reactions that keep the jokes bouncing from actor to actor. A look lasts exactly long enough. A line lands, the laugh rises and the next one is already waiting.
Callahan also makes smart use of small physical choices. Violet’s fan becomes an instrument of judgment, flirtation and possible bodily harm. One flick of Jayley Sams’ wrist can finish an argument before Violet says another word.
It is a simple addition, but it helps us see the fully staged production already living inside the reading.
Four Ghosts Worth Following
Chris Logan Carter gives Chester, a Civil War soldier, an old-fashioned dignity that makes his more childish moments even funnier. Carter plays Chester as a man determined to defend a lady’s honor, meeting every indecent suggestion with the wounded dignity of a gentleman scandalized by the thought—and just curious enough to hear the rest. Carter understands the joke without making Chester the joke.
Jayley Sams is a hoot as Violet. She brings the posture, the sharp tongue and the dangerous little fan. Violet could easily become a single comic attitude, but Sams gives Violet the open heart of a woman ready to fall in love—and makes the audience fall for her first.
Then there is Jeff Hartman as Sam.
Hartman spends much of the play grounding the more outrageous personalities around him. When Sam finally tells his story, the comedy steps aside and the room changes. It involves a dog. That is all I am going to say. Hartman handles the shift with restraint. He lets the story do the damage.
Veronica Talbert brings a bright, Valley Girl bounce to Madison without letting her drift into caricature. At first, Madison seems all airy confidence and actress energy, but Sam’s dismissiveness brings out the steel underneath. He treats her like one more young woman who should take the note, know her place and be grateful for the part. Instead, Madison grows into the person willing to challenge the whole system. Talbert keeps that shift funny, forceful and fully alive—the kind of woman who may enter the afterlife asking what her role is, then decides she ought to rewrite the rules.
Andrew Broering reads the stage directions and supplies a mysterious voice, helping White’s richly described attic take shape in the audience’s imagination. Even without scenery, the setting feels theatrical.
If Only These Ghosts Had More Time
The reading runs approximately 52 minutes, and that is my chief issue with S.A.G. It ends before the audience is ready to leave.
White has created four characters with distinct voices, histories and unfinished business. The structure works, but some of those backstories deserve more room. The audience said much the same during the talkback. There are relationships to deepen, rules of the afterlife to explore and comic trouble still sitting untouched in that attic.
The play does not need to become a two-act marathon. Somewhere between 75 and 90 minutes feels right. Enough time to enlarge the world without burying the speed that makes it work.
The danger would be adding explanations instead of complications. White should not slow the comedy down to tell us everything. She should give these people more things to want, more reasons to clash and a little more time before the final goodbye.
This One Belongs on its Feet
Theatre festivals are supposed to help audiences imagine what a new play might become. With S.A.G., the imagining is easy.
You can see the attic and picture the costumes. You can hear a full house laughing as Violet snaps open that fan or Madison announces another improvement to eternal labor practices.
White has written a genuinely funny play with enough sadness underneath it to keep the comedy from floating away. Callahan understands its rhythm. Carter, Sams, Hartman and Talbert make the ghosts feel ready for a mainstage production.
I do not know what winding road takes a new comedy from a Cincinnati reading to the kind of long commercial life once enjoyed by writers such as Theresa Rebeck. I do know this one deserves the chance to take the next step.
Cincinnati LAB Theatre closed the first weekend of its New Works Festival with a reminder that comedy does not have to be angry, preachy or ashamed of giving an audience a good time. Sometimes four ghosts in an attic are enough. Especially when they have a union grievance.
Shawn Says: S.A.G. is a fast, warm and wonderfully ridiculous comedy that deserves a longer life—and about 15 more minutes.
Production Information
The play was presented July 19th as part of Cincinnati LAB Theatre’s 2026 New Works Festival at the Bell Tower Arts Pavilion in Evendale. There are more shows to see this coming weekend and tickets are available on the website.
- July 23 @ 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm – Enemy of the Good
- July 24 @ 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm – Waiting For Fair
- July 25 @ 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm – Little Boxes
