Sitting in the Spingold Theater Center last fall, watching a rehearsal for the world premiere of her musical “The Two Orphans,” playwright Theresa Rebeck, Ph.D. '89 was transported back to her days as a student at Brandeis.

Huddled with John Sheehy, her co-lyricist for “The Two Orphans” and a friend from their days together in the graduate playwriting program at Brandeis, the two reflected on the journey that had brought them together again.

“It’s surreal to sit in that house where you sat as students and see such a big, glorious production happening,” Rebeck said. “If you had told us 15 years ago that we would be here working on a musical together, we would never have believed it.”

There was a clear symmetry to Rebeck’s decision to allow the new Brandeis Theater Company to produce the premiere of “The Two Orphans,” which was staged on seven days in early December.

After all, Rebeck first read the original melodrama upon which the play is based while she was working on her Ph.D. at Brandeis in the late 1980s. And, following an invitation from Brandeis Theater Company artistic director Eric Hill, she brought the play back to the place where it was first conceived.

“That’s exactly the kind of synchronistic ending for which melodrama is famous,” Rebeck said. “I am thrilled that my orphans are, in a sense, coming home.”

“The Two Orphans” traces the story of two African-American sisters who struggle with survival in a hostile New Orleans in the aftermath of the Civil War and their liberation from slavery..

Composer Kim Sherman wrote the music for “The Two Orphans.” Dennis Garnhum directed the Brandeis Theater Company production..

Hill visited Rebeck in the spring at her home in New York. “He said, ‘We’d love to have you be more involved with the Theater Arts Department. Would you ever consider doing a premiere of a play or a musical?’” Rebeck remembered. “I said, ‘Actually, I do have a musical.’ ”

Rebeck sent Hill the musical, and he called back in just a few days.

“It struck me as being a perfect project for the Brandeis Theater Company,” said Hill, who is also the Barbara Sherman '54 and Malcolm L. Sherman chair of the Theater Arts Department at Brandeis. “We’re featuring the work of a very successful alum, the play touches on issues of social justice, and it’s a musical so it engages a whole range of actors.

“It was like something from heaven when it dropped on my desk.”

The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has made the themes explored in “The Two Orphans” even more relevant today.

“The issues of racial prejudice that the play touches on have been laid bare since the hurricane and have given the play even more resonance,” he said. “The play brings to light issues that the misfortune of Katrina exposed.”

“It’s high quality and high relevance, made all the more relevant by recent events,” said David Colfer, the managing director of the BTC. “The opportunity to shed light on social injustice is at the core of Brandeis.”

The owner of three degrees from Brandeis (M.A. 1983, M.F.A.’86 and Ph.D.’89), Rebeck is an award-winning writer for the stage, screen, television, and radio.

One of the country’s most-produced playwrights, her “Omnium Gatherum” (2003), which she co-wrote with Alexandra Gersten-Vassilaros, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for drama. Other plays to her credit include “View from the Dome,” “Dollhouse,” and “Bad Dates.”

She received a Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award and Writers Guild of America award for Episodic Drama for her work on the TV program “NYPD Blue.” Rebeck has also written for the TV shows “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” and “L.A. Law” and the movies “Catwoman,” “Gossip,” and “Harriet the Spy.”