At some points, and some more strongly than others, Motherhood Out Loud connects with us all. Do we not share the irrefutable fact that each of us was born? Ipso facto, we had a mother. Susan R. Rose and Joan Stein Co-conceivers (the pun is theirs, not mine) have constructed a staged reading whose “universal message [is] of family bonds and love.” Stein writes, “Everyone has a different experience with motherhood, and so we knew that we were looking for very diverse stories.”

And that they have found, with the input from 18 contributing writers (including two men) woven into a tapestry of situational humor, sentiment both sad and angry. Throughout the unbroken 90 minutes, the enduring bonding of mother with child is evidenced.

Four actors divvy up monologues and occasionally brief dialogues. The romanticized joys of pregnancy are exalted and mocked, yet the exhaustion of labor (no surprise) does not obliterate the wonder of birth. Insulation from the big wide world ceases when mothers and toddlers gather at playgrounds. As a somewhat older new mother, Amy Irving is appropriately contemptuous of younger mothers’ nattering and snaps, “Talking with these mommies makes me want to bite them!” The mother of an adopted child is judged not to be a real mother. On the first day of school, the trauma of separation melds with imagined fears. An insensitive sales clerk makes fun of a pubescent girl’s almost non-existent breasts until the incensed mother (bravo Randy Graff) intercedes on behalf of her daughter’s perky breasts, and a perfect nothing of a bra is found. Contending with the first period, the challenge of winged sanitary supplies is conquered. “Sometimes, you have to remind a man that without a woman’s suffering, they wouldn’t exist.” The labyrinth that a gay couple has to navigate to become parents of a surrogate mother’s baby is fraught with hurdles that are described by James Lecesne with the perfect mix of exasperation, determination and ultimate joy. Patriotism and the dread of losing an adult child injects another dose of contemporary reality.

The sleek, sophisticated set – multi-levels of mellowed wood – provide the actors with a generous playing field that is actor-friendly. Jan Hartley’s projection designs on the back wall, primarily Mondrian-like boxes, complements the vignettes. When April Yvette Thompson -- especially poignant as a Salvadoran nannying in America -- calls her mother and young son back home, reassuring them as well as herself they’ll be together soon -- once she's saved enough money -- projected against the back wall are intersecting telephone wires. The stark photos point up the loneliness of separation that Thompson and her loved ones are bearing.

Director Lisa Peterson's minimalist movements are in sync with the varying emotional levels. Her work, appropriately, disappears. Peter Kazorowski’s lighting designs are equally in tune with moments or extended passages: whether wide or spots, his lighting enhances.

Motherhood Out Loud aims for the heart and seldom misses.