[2] Margie Walsh, a lifelong resident of Southie, a blue collar Boston neighborhood,[3] is fired for tardiness from her job as a cashier at a dollar store.

After a verbal game of chicken, Margie shames Mike into inviting her (however reluctantly) to his birthday party in Chestnut Hill.

When Mike calls to tell her that the party has been cancelled, Margie assumes that he is disinviting her because he's embarrassed to have her mix with his bourgeois doctor friends.

Mike's elegant young African American wife Kate at first mistakes Margie for a caterer coming to pick up left-over party paraphernalia.

[5][6][7] Good People was directed by Daniel J. Sullivan and starred Frances McDormand as Margie and Tate Donovan as Mike.

[5][6] Other cast members were Becky Ann Baker as Jean, Patrick Carroll as Stevie, Estelle Parsons as Dottie, and Renée Elise Goldsberry as Kate.

[6][8][9] The creative team included sets by John Lee Beatty, costumes by David Zinn, and lighting by Pat Collins.

Forward Theater of Madison, WI presented the play April 4 – 21, 2013 under the direction of Jennifer Uphoff Gray.

Cast: Janet Greaves as Margie Walsh, Kevin McGowan as Mike, Louise Yates as Jean, Will Close as Stevie, Fiz Marcus as Dottie and Gracy Goldman as Kate.

Imelda Staunton stars in a production at the Hampstead Theatre in London, which previewed from February 27, opened on March 5 and closes on April 5.

[17] Geva Theatre Center presented Good People as part of the 2014-2015 ESL Wilson Mainstage Season from October 21 - November 16.

The cast included Verónica Forqué as Margarita, Juan Fernández, Pilar Castro, Susi Sánchez and Diego Paris.

[27] Jason Clark, in Slant Magazine, stated, "Only David Lindsay-Abaire could write scenes of downtrodden Southie ... As sensitive a modern playwright as can be heard these days, the setups for the scenes in his grandly entertaining Good People—his best work to date—sound like doomed-to-fail, ivory tower-slanted scenarios: a minimum-wage employee being fired for dismal work, an uneasy meeting of old flames (one of which has a spouse of a different race), the needs of a child with a major disability ...

Instead of holding up the play's lead character Margaret (Frances McDormand) as a victim of hard luck, the playwright shrewdly uses her as an example of how choices can make or break us, and the smallest twists of fate determine our path.

"[25] In a negative review, Terry Teachout (The Wall Street Journal), wrote, "I doubt it's a coincidence that they are exactly the kinds of people who fit into the familiar sociological narrative that permeates every page of this play.