Jessica must make an impossible choice.

If she leaves her husband, she knows he will kill himself. But if she stays, she knows it’s her own life that’s on the line.

Jennifer Caress’s award-winning debut play, “The Pool,” is set two years after Jessica leaves her husband, who has indeed done the inevitable. What unravels is an intimate look at how a woman navigates grief. And in this case, with the help of a surprising character — the ghost of her husband, Phillip.

“Unfortunately, it’s something people can resonate with,” said the Colorado Springs playwright. “Not just specifically suicide loss but almost destroying yourself to save someone else who doesn’t want to put in the work to save themselves. And the heartache of love.”

The seven-person play was first produced last year at Three Leaches Theater in Lakewood, followed by a run at the Millibo Art Theatre. From there, Caress submitted it to the Back Door to Broadway Theater Festival in New York City, where it won second place in April.

It will return to the American Theatre of Actors for eight shows Sept. 29 through Oct. 4. The Oct. 3 performance will be livestreamed. Tickets are $30 and available online at hangingcowproductions.com.

Caress’s subject matter lives close to her heart. She is Jessica, on the page and also on the stage, as she stars in the lead role. And her husband did die by suicide in real life, after a 13-year marriage during which she tried to save him. She finally left when it became either her life or his.

“Writing that play was the raw honesty about that journey,” said Caress, a Coronado High School graduate. “The ugly side of grief. The brutal side of grief. The fight it takes to come out on top.”

The 70-minute play began as a monologue Caress wrote while she was still with her husband, trying to describe what it was like to love and leave an addict who wouldn’t do the work to save himself. She put it away and found it two and a half years later, by which point, her estranged husband had died.

“We all knew it was coming,” she said. “I did everything I could to stop it from happening. I found myself at a crossroads where it was painful to stay and painful to leave. I spent a long time standing there not knowing the right way to go. I chose the path that had hope at the end.”

Starring in a drama is a departure for Caress, who performs in the sketch group Dead Puppet Society and the improv troupes Whimsicult and Pretendium.

Writing the script was cleansing, she says, but it’s brutal to relive the experience on stage every night. The hardest part was writing the ending.

“I vowed to myself I wouldn’t show the story to anyone unless it had a happy ending,” she said. “I had no idea what that would look like. I had to turn and face the ghost and say goodbye in a lot of ways. But because of that happy ending I get redemption every night.”

Details
“The Pool,” by Jennifer Caress, livestreamed from the American Theatre of Actors in New York City, 7 p.m. Oct. 3, $30; hangingcowproductions.com.