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The Wolves
Left quad. Right quad. Lunge. A girls indoor soccer team warms up. From the safety of their suburban stretch circle, the team navigates big questions and wages tiny battles with all the vim and vigor of a pack of adolescent warriors. A portrait of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for nine American girls who just want to score some goals.
175 pages, Unknown Binding
First published January 1, 2018
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1498 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 294 reviews
March 13, 2020
i want to keep this play somewhere, like, deep in my heart. contemplate everything i just read and maybe reread in a few weeks and think again. this is very raw and a Lot at once, and i also want to adopt all of these girls AND i am all of them at once, too.
idk, you guys. idk how there's so much feeling and emotion in small little silly dialogue, but then, i DO know, because this play is just so essentially teen and real. like, that's adolescence in less than 200 pages.
it's too much for me to process right now but what i want to say is that The Wolves is brilliant. i hope i live to see it on (my favourite) stage for real. damn.
idk, you guys. idk how there's so much feeling and emotion in small little silly dialogue, but then, i DO know, because this play is just so essentially teen and real. like, that's adolescence in less than 200 pages.
it's too much for me to process right now but what i want to say is that The Wolves is brilliant. i hope i live to see it on (my favourite) stage for real. damn.
January 4, 2025
The way the last four books I read had me crying/sobbing by the end... I AM UNWELL. In case you're wondering what these books were: The Wolves, 84, Charing Cross Road, John Proctor is the Villain & Locke & Key, Vol. 6. It's tough being a girl in this economy.
Anyways, The Wolves is a one-act play by Sarah DeLappe. It premiered Off-Broadway in September 2016. It centers on the experiences of high school girls through their weekly Saturday morning pre-game soccer warmups. The play received multiple awards and was a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
I found a PDF version of the script online, as well as a staging of it on YouTube. I'd highly recommend watching the play, instead of reading it. I interchanged between the two, btw. An integral part of DeLappe's writing is that these girls constantly talk over one another or that multiple different conversations are happening at the same time. On the page, that's hard to convey, and so I had a hard time at the beginning. Once I saw some scenes on YouTube it helped me understand how the text is supposed to work.
The Wolves is set in an indoor soccer facility. Each scene depicts the nine teenage girls who make up the "Wolves", a high school soccer team, conversing while they warm up before their game each week. In most scenes, the team is going through a stretching routine led by #25, the team captain, or doing practice exercises. The girls sometimes continue their gossip from the previous week, bringing up new developments or related topics.
The first scene opens with discussion of the sentencing of an elderly participant of the Cambodian genocide, and conversations stem from there. Overlapping dialogue illustrates an atmosphere where each group of girls have their own, specific conversations while still chiming in on the main topic. These spin-offs include global politics, social gossip about each other and unseen characters, their bodies, their coach's obvious hangovers, their desire to play soccer in college, and speculations about the new girl, #46, who is homeschooled and new to the area. Their conversations are often inappropriate and cause conflict amongst the teammates. #00, the goalie, suffers from social anxiety attacks and runs outside to vomit before each game. #46 slowly begins to fit in and most girls seem to grow more comfortable with each other as the season progresses.
A ski trip taken by #7 and #14 before the second-to-last game leaves the team suffering from injuries and internal drama. #7 suffers a career-ending injury, which forces #46 to step up. She excels, and is even scouted along with two other girls while the rest watch enviously from the sidelines. #14 expresses her anger towards #7 about her neglect during the ski trip and being left with a strange guy (#7's boyfriend's friend). They fight, and end the day on a terrible note.
Tragedy strikes before the final game, which causes #00 to break down in the stadium at night, but also overcome her anxiety. The teammates assume among themselves that the others will ditch the game and they will have to forfeit. However, all of the other girls except #14 come to the stadium one by one, allowing them to play, and they grieve the recent death of #14 in a car accident. As they rally together, Soccer Mom suddenly approaches them, giving them a delirious speech about her late daughter and how the team have banded together in spite of everything, leaving everyone speechless. The team joins in their chant a final time, before Soccer Mom returns with a bag of oranges for them.
Though the plot, especially toward, the end is a bit off the rails, I am able to forgive it since The Wolves mainly serves as a character study and is an interesting examination of girlhood—at least girlhood in Western societies. The play's epigraph consists of a quote by Gertrude Stein: "We are always the same age inside."—which to me illustrates that DeLappe wanted to write a somewhat universal play about the experience of being a girl and woman in today's society. The fears and anxities (from "what if like my pad falls out?" to feeling like you don't fit in), the constant gossiping ("you remember Courtney"–"Oh Jesus Courtney") are something that most female readers would be able to echo.
DeLappe tries her best to adapt how teenagers (Gen Z) talk in our day and age ("ACHOO" – "bless you" – "thanks bitch"), but I would say it's not always authentic, at times, it feels contrived, e.g. "i can DO a fucking bicycle kick" – "then PROVE IT you CUNT" (me: okay, let's calm down). For instance, Kimberly Belflower's John Proctor is the Villain is far more successful at capturing the way teens talk.
The three really heavy topics this play covers are that #7 had an abortion (and it's somewhat of a taboo between the girls), that #14 was being sexually coerced into giving a college boy a blowjob (MEN DESERVE TO BURN ON THE PYRES), and that #14 dies in a car accident which all the girls grieve and have to somehow overcome. These topics are handled with care most of the time but given the short and rather erratic nature of the play, they don't hit as hard a bunch as they could've.
Overall, The Wolves is a solid modern play—if you have the chance to see it somewhere, seize it!
Anyways, The Wolves is a one-act play by Sarah DeLappe. It premiered Off-Broadway in September 2016. It centers on the experiences of high school girls through their weekly Saturday morning pre-game soccer warmups. The play received multiple awards and was a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
I found a PDF version of the script online, as well as a staging of it on YouTube. I'd highly recommend watching the play, instead of reading it. I interchanged between the two, btw. An integral part of DeLappe's writing is that these girls constantly talk over one another or that multiple different conversations are happening at the same time. On the page, that's hard to convey, and so I had a hard time at the beginning. Once I saw some scenes on YouTube it helped me understand how the text is supposed to work.
The Wolves is set in an indoor soccer facility. Each scene depicts the nine teenage girls who make up the "Wolves", a high school soccer team, conversing while they warm up before their game each week. In most scenes, the team is going through a stretching routine led by #25, the team captain, or doing practice exercises. The girls sometimes continue their gossip from the previous week, bringing up new developments or related topics.
The first scene opens with discussion of the sentencing of an elderly participant of the Cambodian genocide, and conversations stem from there. Overlapping dialogue illustrates an atmosphere where each group of girls have their own, specific conversations while still chiming in on the main topic. These spin-offs include global politics, social gossip about each other and unseen characters, their bodies, their coach's obvious hangovers, their desire to play soccer in college, and speculations about the new girl, #46, who is homeschooled and new to the area. Their conversations are often inappropriate and cause conflict amongst the teammates. #00, the goalie, suffers from social anxiety attacks and runs outside to vomit before each game. #46 slowly begins to fit in and most girls seem to grow more comfortable with each other as the season progresses.
A ski trip taken by #7 and #14 before the second-to-last game leaves the team suffering from injuries and internal drama. #7 suffers a career-ending injury, which forces #46 to step up. She excels, and is even scouted along with two other girls while the rest watch enviously from the sidelines. #14 expresses her anger towards #7 about her neglect during the ski trip and being left with a strange guy (#7's boyfriend's friend). They fight, and end the day on a terrible note.
Tragedy strikes before the final game, which causes #00 to break down in the stadium at night, but also overcome her anxiety. The teammates assume among themselves that the others will ditch the game and they will have to forfeit. However, all of the other girls except #14 come to the stadium one by one, allowing them to play, and they grieve the recent death of #14 in a car accident. As they rally together, Soccer Mom suddenly approaches them, giving them a delirious speech about her late daughter and how the team have banded together in spite of everything, leaving everyone speechless. The team joins in their chant a final time, before Soccer Mom returns with a bag of oranges for them.
Though the plot, especially toward, the end is a bit off the rails, I am able to forgive it since The Wolves mainly serves as a character study and is an interesting examination of girlhood—at least girlhood in Western societies. The play's epigraph consists of a quote by Gertrude Stein: "We are always the same age inside."—which to me illustrates that DeLappe wanted to write a somewhat universal play about the experience of being a girl and woman in today's society. The fears and anxities (from "what if like my pad falls out?" to feeling like you don't fit in), the constant gossiping ("you remember Courtney"–"Oh Jesus Courtney") are something that most female readers would be able to echo.
DeLappe tries her best to adapt how teenagers (Gen Z) talk in our day and age ("ACHOO" – "bless you" – "thanks bitch"), but I would say it's not always authentic, at times, it feels contrived, e.g. "i can DO a fucking bicycle kick" – "then PROVE IT you CUNT" (me: okay, let's calm down). For instance, Kimberly Belflower's John Proctor is the Villain is far more successful at capturing the way teens talk.
The three really heavy topics this play covers are that #7 had an abortion (and it's somewhat of a taboo between the girls), that #14 was being sexually coerced into giving a college boy a blowjob (MEN DESERVE TO BURN ON THE PYRES), and that #14 dies in a car accident which all the girls grieve and have to somehow overcome. These topics are handled with care most of the time but given the short and rather erratic nature of the play, they don't hit as hard a bunch as they could've.
Overall, The Wolves is a solid modern play—if you have the chance to see it somewhere, seize it!
Read
November 14, 2023Exactly the material I was looking for as a young actor when I’d desperately wander around Sam French in search of higher-quality material for acting class/scene study, and the kind of play I wish my high school would have put up instead of only musicals all year — but it didn’t exist yet.
As a young actor, especially a young actor who happens to be a girl, what happened instead in class and on stage is that you’d end up with teen crisis material that was too mature and intense and that maybe you just wanted to wait on a bit until you were older in terms of your studies, or if not that, then the role was older in a different way (character is a grad student, married, mother, stock broker, flight attendant…) and so far from your experience or artistic interest at the time. So what was available until really only a short time ago due to both cultural and industry sexism and how that impacts what is funded and created and taken seriously were plays decades old written by older men with maybe one, two or three teen characters alongside adults and not written as authentically because they got by without being challenged to write girls and young women well.
Which is all just to say: more quality, original work for younger actors, like, just like this, is much needed (and, like, soooo super cool).
2023
As a young actor, especially a young actor who happens to be a girl, what happened instead in class and on stage is that you’d end up with teen crisis material that was too mature and intense and that maybe you just wanted to wait on a bit until you were older in terms of your studies, or if not that, then the role was older in a different way (character is a grad student, married, mother, stock broker, flight attendant…) and so far from your experience or artistic interest at the time. So what was available until really only a short time ago due to both cultural and industry sexism and how that impacts what is funded and created and taken seriously were plays decades old written by older men with maybe one, two or three teen characters alongside adults and not written as authentically because they got by without being challenged to write girls and young women well.
Which is all just to say: more quality, original work for younger actors, like, just like this, is much needed (and, like, soooo super cool).
2023
July 23, 2019
A bit hard to follow each individual character the way the text is laid out, but it was incredibly refreshing to read a story that accurately represents how a teenage girl’s everyday life is.
Would love to see this staged one day!
Would love to see this staged one day!
November 13, 2025
Watched it at Douglas College
Apr 2025 i guess
Apr 2025 i guess
May 16, 2017
Just an outstanding look at life from the perspective of a girls indoor soccer team. It has joy and energy and complexity, and never feels hamfisted or preachy. I look forward too seeing it in production someday.
May 1, 2022
I have never read dialogue this real and authentically teen before. Every “like” felt purposeful, never forced. It’s impressive to feel such pathos in characters who kind of aren’t talking about anything important??? Loved
August 24, 2025
I just think we should start listening a whole lot harder to teenage girls
January 4, 2019
WOW! What a radical and awesome new play. Such a unique script. I’ve read nothing like it before. If you want some radical feminism packaged in a teenage women’s soccer team preparing for battle pick this up immediately. Delappe captures so perfectly what it’s like to be a girl, struggle with your identity, and still want to give it all for your team. I read this to discuss with my advanced theater students and within one scene they were hooked. Such a knock out.
July 31, 2017
What a fantastically interesting play.
It provides a platform for girls/young women to present themselves sans male relationships, or societal enforcers. We see snippets of real life pass by. Just the ladies. Just the honesty. Just the fierceness.
Man. I'd love to do this show.
It provides a platform for girls/young women to present themselves sans male relationships, or societal enforcers. We see snippets of real life pass by. Just the ladies. Just the honesty. Just the fierceness.
Man. I'd love to do this show.
December 16, 2018
so special and funny and sweet and really really good at tricking you into thinking it’s more casual than it actually is. there’s a lot more going on here than it may seem. incredible stuff.
February 18, 2025
The way this was written, was so fun and addicting. I wish I could see this staged. I could see it so clearly.
August 8, 2025
August’s play reading! My favorite part was when they started singing the schoolhouse rock preamble song. Great play!! Clearly foundational for the genre of contemporary plays about groups of young women.
December 29, 2024
The Wolves x Yellowjackets crossover when
June 14, 2022
A fascinating little show that does not name its characters by anything other than their jersey names. A lack of names means everyone has to work harder to develop, yet everyone feels well-constructed; the dialogue is smooth, real, enticing. Each character even gets the chance to develop: #25 slowly grows towards a coming out arc, though a subtle one, and #46 gets a strong character arc. The relationship between #7 and #14 is written with so much texture. I loved this vicious little show and would love to see it sometime.
Cast
#11 Midfield. Brainy, morbid, budding elitist, thoughtful. Seventeen.
#25 Defense, Captain. Classic (ex)coach’s daughter. Seventeen.
#13 Midfield. Stoner, older pot dealer brother, into her wackiness. Sixteen.
#46 Bench. New girl. Awkward, different, just wants to fit in. Sixteen.
#2 Defense. Innocent, unlucky, kind, skinny. Sixteen.
#7 Striker. Too cool for school. Sarcastic, “fuck”, thick eyeliner. Almost seventeen.
#14 Midfield. #7’s insecure sidekick. Just switched to contacts. Sixteen.
#8 Defense. Plays dumber than she is. Sixteen.
#00 Goalie. Intense performance anxiety, perfectionist, high achiever. Seventeen.
SPOILER:
Blog | Youtube | Twitter | Instagram | Spotify | About |
Cast
#11 Midfield. Brainy, morbid, budding elitist, thoughtful. Seventeen.
#25 Defense, Captain. Classic (ex)coach’s daughter. Seventeen.
#13 Midfield. Stoner, older pot dealer brother, into her wackiness. Sixteen.
#46 Bench. New girl. Awkward, different, just wants to fit in. Sixteen.
#2 Defense. Innocent, unlucky, kind, skinny. Sixteen.
#7 Striker. Too cool for school. Sarcastic, “fuck”, thick eyeliner. Almost seventeen.
#14 Midfield. #7’s insecure sidekick. Just switched to contacts. Sixteen.
#8 Defense. Plays dumber than she is. Sixteen.
#00 Goalie. Intense performance anxiety, perfectionist, high achiever. Seventeen.
SPOILER:
Blog | Youtube | Twitter | Instagram | Spotify | About |
February 14, 2023
This brought me back to being a teen in all the most emotional ways. I've been reflecting on these years as a way to heal that puberty-trauma most go through in becoming women, and this play was the perfect amount of #girlboss I needed as a balm.
Post-puberty Eavan did not take to womanhood easily; I was very athletic and a bit mean (just like these girls), and I eventually dropped out of club soccer due to not fitting in. DeLappe understands, in the most realistic way I have seen depicted, becoming a woman in modern America.
So... Why are we girls so fucking mean to each other? Why do we police each other in the stupidest ways? Why don't we ask each other how we're doing?
Sidenote: I saw a production of this in Canada. The audience did not know what to do with the Tulsa joke and actually wanted to laugh during the Preamble song. It was... odd. I miss the US.
Post-puberty Eavan did not take to womanhood easily; I was very athletic and a bit mean (just like these girls), and I eventually dropped out of club soccer due to not fitting in. DeLappe understands, in the most realistic way I have seen depicted, becoming a woman in modern America.
So... Why are we girls so fucking mean to each other? Why do we police each other in the stupidest ways? Why don't we ask each other how we're doing?
Sidenote: I saw a production of this in Canada. The audience did not know what to do with the Tulsa joke and actually wanted to laugh during the Preamble song. It was... odd. I miss the US.
July 29, 2020
Very mixed feelings on this script. Tries to say too much, too many talking points and hot takes that they all become jumbled up and dropped, never to be touched upon again. The numbers are dehumanizing, making it hard to truly emphasize with any of the characters. The girls are borderline 2 dimensional, merely mouthpieces for what the playwright is trying to say. I write all of this and yet I still found the ending touching. It honestly just depends on the direction that a production decides to go in that will determine the quality.
April 28, 2023
just a perfect encapsulation of teenage girlhood in all its messy glory. I adored reading this play, these girls' voices were spot on, and the way DeLappe used the outside world to inform the girls and their bubble.
I could talk about this forever - the insularity of the team, the numbers, the setting of the indoor turf field, the dome, the holding of current world events and personal events in equal prominence, the characterization of #46, just... everything. honestly might be the perfect play and I loved it so much.
I could talk about this forever - the insularity of the team, the numbers, the setting of the indoor turf field, the dome, the holding of current world events and personal events in equal prominence, the characterization of #46, just... everything. honestly might be the perfect play and I loved it so much.
October 2, 2018
For a first effort, this is really impressive, and I can see why it got the Pulitzer nod. My main problem in reading it, is that the characters are hard to differentiate on the page, especially since they are all delineated by their jersey numbers, and we don't find out anyone's name till late in the game (so to speak!) Also, the ending is a bit melodramatic and again, I found it hard to understand exactly WHO was 'missing', due to the no names conceit.
January 31, 2020
Sarah DeLappe's The Wolves is an exuberant ensemble piece that picks up steam as it goes. With vivid personalities, excellent voice, and both great comedic and dramatic timing, DeLappe paints a portrait of one indoor soccer team trying their best to survive and relate to each other, even if the world is changing around them. It's visceral, savage, embarrassing, but beautiful at the same time.
August 27, 2018
I find the whole comedic viewpoint of “isn’t it interesting how rich, sheltered suburban kids process substantive political issues” to be a pretty uninteresting cheat that allows writers to absolve their own shallow engagement with the world. Lame.
Read
November 22, 2022A really great play. I wish there was more to it, but think a lot of ground was covered even in the short amount of time.
(I was recently cast #8 at my community theatre and I’m definitely taking advantage of it… 🤪 I will conquer my reading goal this year!!)
(I was recently cast #8 at my community theatre and I’m definitely taking advantage of it… 🤪 I will conquer my reading goal this year!!)
February 21, 2019
LOVE LOVE LOVE. Yes to women onstage. Yes to realistic dialogue with simultaneous conversations. Yes to this STRUCTURE. Just yeses all around.
December 17, 2022
Umm the ending really came out of no where??? Why throw in that curve ball?
April 4, 2023
3⭐
ok.
ok.
March 6, 2024
This one’s special. If you know you know. 🐺⚽️💚
September 10, 2024
I read this for my Playwriting class
And let me say a few things.
First, this book is perfect. It’s witty, it’s funny, it’s relatable, it is SO TRUE to the “messy girlhood experience”. This book is a fantastic study on how to write witty, realistic, and wonderful dialogue as well as how to breathe life into a cast of characters. Besides just being funny and relatable, it’s hard hitting in ways that really matter. Chances are, you’ll have a favorite character in this play, and chances are, they’ll be like you, and chances are, you’ll realize how like her you once were and go “huh, I remember that”. To write that well is a triumph.
On a more personal note, I mentioned reading this for a class. It was our first day when we decided to act out some of the show, and I certainly think it brought us closer together. We all were laughing, actually talking to one another, and connecting (in a way that is often rare in a college class). So not only did this book just prove to be a fantastic read, but it proved to be a meaningful one with the capability of getting a bunch of tired, overworked, jaded college students to actually like each other.
Pretty spectacular if you ask me.
And let me say a few things.
First, this book is perfect. It’s witty, it’s funny, it’s relatable, it is SO TRUE to the “messy girlhood experience”. This book is a fantastic study on how to write witty, realistic, and wonderful dialogue as well as how to breathe life into a cast of characters. Besides just being funny and relatable, it’s hard hitting in ways that really matter. Chances are, you’ll have a favorite character in this play, and chances are, they’ll be like you, and chances are, you’ll realize how like her you once were and go “huh, I remember that”. To write that well is a triumph.
On a more personal note, I mentioned reading this for a class. It was our first day when we decided to act out some of the show, and I certainly think it brought us closer together. We all were laughing, actually talking to one another, and connecting (in a way that is often rare in a college class). So not only did this book just prove to be a fantastic read, but it proved to be a meaningful one with the capability of getting a bunch of tired, overworked, jaded college students to actually like each other.
Pretty spectacular if you ask me.
November 12, 2022
hoogh. i feel insane. this play's dialogue and characters are so incredibly naturalistic and that just makes the emotions hit so much harder. i watched along with a production which made it a bit easier to keep track of the characters because i think that might have been hard just reading but overall i feel peeled.
October 18, 2022
Honestly I have been reading a lot of plays for my class and this has to be my favorite so far. It was so organic and authentic to a teenage girl experience. The dialogue, interactions, dynamics, topics were so spot on and it really just stands out from the other plays I have been reading.
April 25, 2025
3.5 stars.
would love to see this live to really feel the pacing of it, but i enjoyed this a lot and it felt very much like realistic 16-17 year-old girls. also, the orange slice scene gave me such specific flashbacks to playing soccer as a young teenager, that was incredible
would love to see this live to really feel the pacing of it, but i enjoyed this a lot and it felt very much like realistic 16-17 year-old girls. also, the orange slice scene gave me such specific flashbacks to playing soccer as a young teenager, that was incredible
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