Posted by MickSeven 2013-01-21 18:36:21
Hello, I am considering seeing this play as I like the subject and cast.Did anyone attend a preview?Clive
Posted by After Eight 2013-01-21 23:17:02
This one's a doozy.
A free-form hodgepodge and a complete mess, directed and played in overwrought style by Ethan Hawke. The good cast is wasted. After a few scenes, you'll find yourslf either nodding off or composing your grocery list for the week.
There are a couple of incongruous laughs here and there, but those are slim pickings indeed in this trial of an evening. I guess it would fall under the guise of experimental theatre. Too bad the audience has to act as guinea pigs.
Clive
Posted by TotallyEffed 2013-01-21 23:43:50
This one was very hard to get through. By the end I wanted to yell out to them to just STOP so I could leave! Eventually I just had to give up on the show because my mind could not stop wandering. A boring mess. And I love Brecht. With no intermission, I felt my skin begin to crawl by the end of it.
Clive
Posted by kevinr 2013-01-21 23:46:36
I am seeing this when I am in New York in two weeks....hoping to meet Ethan Hawke and Vincent. Do they sign/ take photos at the stage door? Thanks!
Clive
Posted by Sauja 2013-01-22 11:40:27
I'm curious about this show in spite of the fact I've heard NOTHING good about it. That curiosity may just be because I'm wondering what form it actually takes. Is it a linear story? How does the music factor in? Is it at all faithful to Baal? And I saw the warnings about strong language and sexual content: it's not as aggressive and ridiculous as this company's Burning was, is it?
Clive
Posted by EllenRonnie 2013-01-22 20:05:57
I'm with you on Clive.
Yes! I was thinking about my grocery shopping AND I also gave up on it and couldn't wait for it to end.
It just felt like an amateurish college experimental play. I knew it was going to be different and I was okay with that, but it failed to connect with the audience.
Interestingly, the people who I saw it with, including myself, felt kinda stunned afterwards. It felt like an assault and it took a while to shake it.
I felt bad because I know everyone worked so hard on it.
It was a thrill to see Vincent D'onofrio and I just wish the play was worthy of everyone who was in it.
Clive
Posted by Matt Rogers 2013-01-22 20:09:50
There are also multiple negative posts on All That Chat.
Clive
Posted by TotallyEffed 2013-01-22 20:25:52
EllenRonnie, you hit the nail on the head. I said the exact thing after I saw it. It felt very college.
Clive
Posted by chrisampm2 2013-01-22 21:42:28
I hope it's like The Burning, which was indeed ridiculous, but in interesting, intentional ways.
Clive
Posted by After Eight 2013-01-22 22:06:43
Chris,
It's not as interesting as The Burning. It's incoherent, actually.
Sauja,
It does follow the basic outline of Baal, but with actors essaying multiple roles, and with neither the characters nor the situations clearly identified, it's all just a mishmash. The music has New Age resonances that are interesting. It's not as
aggressively vulgar as some things we've seen: Mother/Hat, Jerusalem, Book of Mormon, etc. I wasn't shocked by it; just bored.
With the director playing the lead and the author in the cast, and in the self-indulgent tenor of the whole show, it has the aura of a vanity production.
Clive
Posted by frogs_fan85 2013-01-22 22:09:08
I just survived tonight's performance. I think the guy running the board had to start the applause at the end because nobody in the audience reacted at the blackout.
I spent the second half figuring out where I should go for dinner.
Despite everything, I did at least enjoy Vincent D'Onofrio's performance.
Clive
Posted by musicman_bwayfan 2013-02-06 02:52:55
What's the deal with the nudity in this show & strong sexual content?
Clive
Posted by SFFrontRow 2013-02-06 17:42:52
I attended a preview and could not agree more with those that have posted how random and college this was.
I went because I love Zoe Kazan - saw her in Angels at the Signature and also loved her in "It's Complicated" (a truly great quiet movie that gets better with additional viewings).
I left wondering what the heck that show was about and how such a seemingly random collection of scenes could make it to the stage. The audience reaction while leaving the theater was pretty consistent - what the heck did I just see.
The best part of the play was they eliminated the intermission and it ended sooner (maybe they did that to keep the audience from escaping).
Clive
Posted by aaronb 2013-02-19 10:28:17
I have strong feelings:
"In her notes on the production, dramaturge Cobina Gillet remarks that the critic Alfred Kerr, scandalized by the 1923 premiere of Baal, wrote, 'Liquor, liquor, liquor, naked, naked, naked women.' This suggests something more audacious or at least more interesting than Clive, a play that features heavy drinking but no nudity; and as anyone who has ever been the designated driver knows, watching people get drunk is no fun. Jonathan Marc Shermans adaptation evokes that sense of restlessness you get while listening to the inebriated as they insist on telling and retelling the same stories without offering you a convenient exit."
