Wallace Shawn, André Gregory reunite with 'What We Did Before Our Moth Days' off Broadway

Gregory, Shawn’s co-creator and co-star of the 1981 film My Dinner with Andre and frequent collaborator, will direct his latest play from the writer and actor.

What We Did Before Our Moth Days, a new play written and co-produced by Wallace Shawn, will premiere off Broadway this winter at the Greenwich House Theater. Performances begin on February 4 ahead of a March 5 opening night.

Hope Davis, Maria Dizzia, John Early, and Josh Hamilton star in the play about an urban, middle-class family: a father, mother, son, and the father's longtime mistress. As they tell the story of their lives, they explore remorse, sorrow, resentment, joy, and the simultaneously suffocating and freeing nature of love.

“We don't understand ourselves, and we don't know why we do what we do," Shawn said in a statement about What We Did Before Our Moth Days. "Ideally, then, dangerous weapons should be kept out of our hands at all times, but in romantic, sexual, and familial relationships we carry the weapon of our own feelings strapped to our chests whether we like it or not. This is a play about four intelligent and thoughtful people — mother, father, son, and father's mistress — living in a somewhat violent but sophisticated city.”

Shawn is a prolific Off-Broadway playwright whose other works include the Obie Award–winning Aunt Dan and Lemon, The Designated Mourner, and Grasses of a Thousand Colors. He is best known, however, for his screen roles as Vizzini in The Princess Bride, Mr. Hall in Clueless, Dr. John Sturgis in Young Sheldon, and the voice of Rex in the Toy Story franchise.

Directing What We Did Before Our Moth Days is André Gregory, Shawn’s co-writer and co-star of the 1981 film My Dinner with Andre. The pair are longtime collaborators in film and theatre; their other onscreen projects include Vanya on 42nd Street and A Master Builder.

“My life in the theatre has often been my life with Wally Shawn," Gregory said in a statement. "I have been his acting teacher, his collaborator, his director, his friend. We have done plays together and we have done films together. We have been partners for over half a century. And with his new play, What We Did Before Our Moth Days, we are continuing the tradition. We are still going strong. Together.”

What We Did Before Our Moth Days features scenic design by Riccardo Hernández, costume design by Ann Roth, lighting design by Jennifer Tipton, and sound design and original music by Bruce Odland.

News of the production was first teased in a March 2025 The New York Times article.

Check back for information on What We Did Before Our Moth Days tickets on New York Theatre Guide.

Photo credit: Wallace Shawn, André Gregory, Hope Davis, Maria Dizzia, John Early, and Josh Hamilton. (Photos courtesy of production; Shawn photo by Don J. Usner; Gregory photo by Tony Kahn; Dizzia photo by Tess Mayer; Early photo by Sela Shiloni)