The Performance Network opens its season with a difficult perspective on political conflict, the children compelled to fight for their countries, and the parents who think they know better. However, the David Wolber–directed Sonia Flew doesn't feel like propaganda; instead, it presents two beautifully sad family portraits that make the political very personal indeed.

Playwright Melinda Lopez's intriguing structure presents challenges that pay off handsomely in this production. The first act introduces a contemporary family preparing to celebrate the holidays just months after 9/11. Son Zak (Russ Schwartz) confidently defends his revelation that he is leaving college to enlist in the military, which upsets no one more than his mother, Sonia (Milica Govich). Although its members are at odds, this family certainly feels like a cohesive unit, and the ensuing dinner-table battle sets the stakes high. Zak alludes to Sonia's own origins in Cuba and the circumstances of her departure, which she swears she will never talk about — until the second act, set in 1961 Havana, with the same cast switching roles to depict the flight of young Sonia (Christina L. Flynn), part of a real movement known as Operation Pedro Pan.