"Unexpected Family" is a two-act play that explores the collision of generations, identities, and grief as an unlikely trio forms a new family unit. The story centers on Beatrice “GiGi Bea” Holloway, a 70ish former B-movie actress living in a faded-glamour Burbank home filled with theatrical relics. Her life is upended when her estranged grandson Michael’s daughters—19-year-old Eliana and 15-year-old Meekah, both Black—arrive after their parents’ tragic death in a plane crash. Unaware of their racial background due to Michael’s secrecy, Beatrice is initially shocked but resolves to embrace them as her only remaining family.

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Eliana, practical and protective, pauses her business studies to care for her artistic younger sister Meekah, who processes her grief through music. The sisters’ arrival forces Beatrice to confront her past—her unfulfilled Hollywood dreams, her strained relationship with Michael, and the subtle prejudices of her upbringing. Supported by her neighbor Phillip, a wry theater veteran, Beatrice navigates this new reality, while her conservative frenemy Dorothy Whitfield stirs tension with her initial judgmental reactions.