Lauren Gunderson’s play about a virologist, his family and the limits of what we can control opens Sept. 18 at SilCo’s intimate Henry Studio.

Theatre SilCo opens Lauren Gunderson’s The Catastrophist Sept. 18, a play about fathers and sons, memory and the vulnerability of caring for people we can’t always protect.

The production runs Sept. 18-Oct. 4 in the 60-seat Henry Studio at the Silverthorne Performing Arts Center. It stars former Theatre SilCo Executive Director Josh Blanchard, returning to the stage after eight years away, and incorporates projections, sound design and optional scent elements.

The Catastrophist marks the theatre’s third production of a Gunderson play, following The Revolutionists and The Half-Life of Marie Curie.

Blanchard plays Nathan Wolfe, a virologist whose global research is matched by questions closer to home: what he carries forward from his parents, and how he confronts fatherhood when so much lies beyond his control. Gunderson’s script moves between the forests of Cameroon and personal memory to explore love, discovery and grief.

“I love where art and science meet in this play,” said Chris Alleman, SilCo’s producing artistic director. “We can get so caught up in understanding the world and figuring out our place in it that we forget to check in on what’s right in front of us — family, our friends, even ourselves. Nathan is trying to make sense of these enormous questions, but it’s the everyday things that sneak up on him. That’s where the humor and heart of this show live.”

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