Hogfish’s world premiere musical “Wholly Unwinding” is a genre-defying theater experience
“Wholly Unwinding,” the world premiere musical by Hailey McAvoy, is a rare moment that you have just two more chances to see.
“Millennial singer-songwriter” doesn’t quite describe Hailey McAvoy. Neither do the monikers composer, lyricist, visual artist, actor or performer. She’s an iconoclast, an artist creating a form of theater that feels uniquely her own. Yet she isn’t simply a multi-hyphenate artist; she erases hyphens and genre categorization altogether, weaving music, image, story and embodiment into a singularly powerful experience.
It’s difficult to think of another contemporary artist who has written every song, finessed each lyric, created the visuals, and then can step onto the stage to inhabit her own deeply autobiographical story with such vulnerability, humor and vocal brilliance. “Wholly Unwinding” is not simply performed by its creator — it is lived by her and should be experienced by you.
Emerging from Hogfish’s Artist Residency in Maine, “Wholly Unwinding” will move this fall to National Sawdust in New York City, one of the country’s leading venues for premiering new operas and interdisciplinary works. The work was inspired by McAvoy’s experience growing up with cerebral palsy and her later discovery of the Alexander Technique, a movement and body-awareness practice used to enhance performance through more efficient use of the body.
The show begins as though it were a familiar musical fairy tale. Performers narrate the life of “the little girl,” while doctors, teachers and well-meaning caregivers speak about her rather than to her.
As the story becomes increasingly more sentimental and absurdly ableist, McAvoy can no longer bear it. She stops the musical. Turning directly to the audience, she quietly explains that much of what they have just witnessed isn’t how it happened. Then comes the evening’s pivotal invitation:
“I’ve never been invited to tell my story. Since you’re all here… would you like to hear it from my perspective?”
From that moment forward, the story belongs to her. McAvoy continues to speak directly to the audience in the first person, reclaiming authorship of her own life. What follows is not a revision of the earlier narrative, but a liberation. The musical asks a powerful question that lingers long after the final curtain drops:
What becomes possible when we listen to the songs of our scars?
The answer unfolds through a remarkable score filled with melodies that will follow audiences home. McAvoy possesses that rare gift of writing songs that feel as though they have always existed. They arrive with the familiarity of folk music and the emotional immediacy of today’s finest singer-songwriters. Days later, audiences may still find themselves humming songs that linger not only because they are memorable, but because they speak to something deeply human.
The opening anthem, “Laying Down Armor,” possesses the quiet power of a hymn, inviting the performers and audience into a shared act of surrender. “Frightened Bird,” a haunting, chant-like meditation, gives voice to the fear that lives beneath years of self-protection.
“Carry You Home” grows into an exhilarating ensemble celebration as McAvoy welcomes her own leg back into her consciousness after years of denying it in a breathtaking act of reconciliation transformed into song.
And in perhaps the emotional heart of the show, “I Have to Love You” is a luminous ballad of self-acceptance, arriving at the simple yet profound realization that, at the end of the day, the greatest teacher is the one that has lived within us all along.
These are songs that transcend traditional musical theater, they’re songs audiences leave singing.
Directed by Hogfish co-founder Edwin Cahill, the production’s theatrical structure reveals the profound difference between the stories told about disabled people and the stories they finally get to tell themselves. The stage becomes a forest of foraged branches and trees inspired by disability writer Eli Clare’s observation in “Brilliant Imperfection” that many of North America’s oldest trees escaped harvest because they grew curved, sinuous, or “imperfect.” Spared the axe, they became ancient witnesses. In “Wholly Unwinding,” these “disabled” trees stand as ancestors, reminding us that what our culture too often overlooks may hold exactly the medicine we need to find our way back to ourselves, and to one another.
McAvoy is joined by an exceptional ensemble of performers who traveled from their home states to be part of the company, portraying friends and family who accompany her on her journey: Annie Blair, Melisa Bonetti Luna, Cinnamon Denise, Halley Elwell (from Hallowell, Maine), Jerzy Gillon, Joëlle Santiago and Gileann Tan.
The ensemble is so much more than supporting characters. They are witnesses, companions, and the “inner dialogue” chorus of Hailey’s own inner life. Their soaring voices intertwine in lush harmonies that give the score extraordinary warmth and emotional depth. Throughout the evening, McAvoy is accompanied at the piano by her real-life partner, Bethany Pietroniro, whose expressive playing becomes a powerful witness to the story unfolding onstage. A small silent chorus of Alexander Technique teachers quietly move among the performers, offering hands-on guidance to bring into focus the unseen presence of the teachers and loving hands that continue to shape us long after we think they are gone.
The Wholly Unwinding Ensemble debut one of the show’s most powerful moments in a recent outdoor performance. Photo: Meredith Brockington Meredith Brockington Photography
The pre-show experience includes an exhibition curated by Double House Arts, with work by artists from Portland’s disability community, alongside the orthopedic casts McAvoy wore throughout her childhood. These medical artifacts are deeply human symbols of resilience and transformation. Guests are also invited to experience hands-on Alexander Technique chair turns, offering a glimpse into the practice that transformed her life.
Hailey McAvoy sharing the healing power of performance in a scene from Wholly Unwinding.
Photo: Meredith Brockington Photography
Costume designer Loquat created the performers’ garments. Designed in close dialogue with the artists, each piece becomes part of the individual wearing it rather than disguising them as a supporting character.
McAvoy opens the musical in an almost classical suit of golden armor. With each song, she sheds another layer, hanging it on the surrounding trees as she unwinds her unseen binds. As the show reaches its climax, she stands in a simple white camisole with her scars illuminated as blooming red roses in a powerful image of transformation.
After the final curtain, the evening continues as Holly Taylor in collaboration with Spark Inclusive Arts, leads an interactive, community-inclusive dance party where people of all abilities are invited onto the dance floor to remixes of McAvoy’s songs. It is a celebratory conclusion to a musical that envisions a more connected world with a chance to not simply applaud the story, but to step into it.
This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Maine audiences to experience the world premiere of a remarkable new musical and to witness the emergence of one of the most exciting new singer-songwriters in a generation.
Hogfish’s “Wholly Unwinding” — Know before you go
Two performances at Halo at Thompson’s Point
Friday, July 24 at 7 p.m.
Saturday, July 25 at 1 p.m.
Tickets: hogfish.org/buytickets
The Saturday matinee is designed to honor our neurodiverse and disabled community members with ASL interpretation and handheld receivers or headsets for audio narration of visual elements. In this sensory-friendly performance, audience members are encouraged to move about the space and vocalize as needed, while ambient daylight will allow for a lower contrast lighting design, as well as greater visibility within the seating area.
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