Little Women — Christmas at Century Village

“Never liked girls or knew many, except my sisters.”

— Louisa May Alcott, who wrote a masterpiece out of the family she almost didn't want to write about

Join us for a night of live theater, history, Christmas cheer, caroling, and community.

The Story Behind the Story

Louisa May Alcott almost didn't write it. Her publisher pushed her to try a "girls' book" — she wasn't interested, and later called the writing dull. She wrote the entire first half in just ten weeks at a small desk her father built her. It became one of the best-selling novels ever published.

The March sisters weren't invented — they were her own family, barely disguised. Meg was her sister Anna, whose real wedding is the one described in the book. Beth was Lizzie, who caught scarlet fever caring for a poor family and never fully recovered — she died at 22. Amy was May (an anagram — Alcott wasn't even trying to hide it), an artist whose work later hung in the Paris Salon. And Jo — restless, stubborn, refusing to marry the boy next door just because readers wanted her to — was Alcott herself.

That's the story Auburn Church has hosted for generations of Christmas nights: real sisters, real loss, real refusal to be told who to become. Come see it live, in a building older than the book itself.

Four showtimes. One historic church. The last chance this season to see the March sisters brought to life where Geauga County's own history still lives.