Broadway Blogs - Review Roundup: Joe Turner's Come and Gone and More...

Joe Turner's Come and Gone is set in a Pittsburgh boarding house in 1911. Owners Seth and Bertha Holly play host to a makeshift family of people who come to stay. Among those on the move is Herald Loomis, who arrives at the boarding house with his daughter in tow, and discovers amid the vibrant community there, a path from his lost spirit to a new life.

Ben Brantley, The New York Times: "Great works of art often tote heavy baggage. Yet the revival of August Wilson's "Joe Turner's Come and Gone," a drama of indisputable greatness, feels positively airborne. Much of Bartlett Sher's splendid production, which opened Thursday night at the Belasco Theater, moves with the engaging ease of lively, casual conversation."

Joe Dziemianowicz, NY Daily News: "Sher's production joins several Wilson works - three revivals and the debut of his last play, "Radio Golf" - seen in New York since his death in 2005. If they're as great as "Joe Turner," keep them coming."

David Rooney, Variety: "When the cast explodes into a rowdy Juba in "Joe Turner's Come and Gone," their joyous, spirit-summoning dance suggests roots stretching back to African tribal movement and forward through tap and jazz right up to hip-hop. That same panoramic breadth is reflected in the characters themselves, their histories bound to the still-raw wounds of slavery while their hopes and destinies reach far into a future mapped out in ongoing struggle. August Wilson's gift for storytelling has rarely been more beguiling than in this lyrical 1986 drama, and in his searing revival, director Bartlett Sher makes every note strong and true."

Michael Kuchwara, Associated Press: ""Joe Turner," which opened Thursday at the Belasco Theatre, is one of Wilson's finest, rich in character and a poetry that suggests the world-weariness of the blues. Both come through in this impeccable Bartlett Sher-directed revival, more impressionistic than its predecessor but, nonetheless, ablaze in the theatricality you expect from Wilson."

Frank Scheck, NY Post: "A critical success but commercial failure back in 1988, this challenging work demands the tender loving care only a well-funded nonprofit troupe can provide. Bartlett Sher's superb production captures all of the emotional and stylistic nuances of the play, even if his staging gets a bit gimmicky."

John Simon, Bloomberg News: "Some of the plays are better than others, successful roughly in inverse proportion to the amount of metaphysics, mysticism and the supernatural they contain. In this respect, "Joe Turner" is one of the chief offenders, weltering in several kinds of high-flown overreaching."

Elysa Gardner, USA Today: "No playwright understood better than August Wilson that freedom is, at least in part, a state of mind. And none of Wilson's plays addressed the particular challenges faced by black Americans seeking it more directly or movingly than Joe Turner's Come and Gone, now being revived by Lincoln Center Theater."

Terry Teachout, The Wall Street Journal: "But "Joe Turner," which was last seen on Broadway for three months in 1988, is out of his top drawer, and this revival, whose magnificent cast has been directed by Bartlett Sher with uncommon sensitivity, might just manage to break the late playwright's long string of bad luck."

There's a moment in Show Boat where a woman sings that her true love, "just plain Bill," is "an ordinary man" who "isn't half as handsome as dozens of men" and is, on the whole, kinda stupid. This is considered by many to be one of the most romantic love songs of the 20th Century. In Neil LaBute's somewhat revised (like this review) Off-Broadway to Broadway transfer of reasons to be pretty, the main character, reacting to his buddy's ravings about how hot another woman is, says that his girlfriend of four years may be "regular" looking, but he wouldn't trade her for a million bucks. This will not be considered one of the most romantic sentiments of the 21st Century.

In a culture where looking like an "average Joe" or a "regular guy" would be accepted with no offense by most men, is it any wonder that the unschooled male may have no reason to believe a woman wouldn't feel the same way? Does that sound naïve? Perhaps, but if someone sincerely pays you a compliment and you accept it as a criticism, does the offense lie in the words spoken or in the way they land on the ear? Don't expect answers from LaBute; a neat little feature of the play is that the author, as he's been known to do now and then, dangles before us so many ambiguities about the relationship between Greg (Thomas Sadoski) and Steph (Marin Ireland) and provides so little information about their past that if you assume it's just another case of a guy being thoughtless you may have trouble backing your feelings up with facts.

As the play progresses we get no concrete reason to believe that Greg, who works the night shift loading boxes in a warehouse and spends his 3am lunch breaks trying to educate himself through reading classic literature, is anything but a good guy who cares very much for Steph and would never do anything to intentionally hurt her. But try telling that to his livid gf who is furious during the electrically charged scene that opens the play because Greg's co-worker Carly (Piper Perabo) has told her she overheard her bf saying she's ugly.

Okay, so maybe he did say "ugly" and is lying to Steph to cover his butt, but perhaps to Carly, who may complain that it's hard being pretty but is happy not to suffer the alternative, "regular" might just as well mean "ugly." Though costume designer Sarah J. Holden covers up her figure in the unflattering security guard uniform she wears at work, we get the impression from her husband, Greg's co-worker/buddy Kent (Steven Pasquale), that she has an amazing ass. Her ass, in fact, seems to be the number one thing he likes about her. So much so that when her pregnancy causes her ass to grow a bit, he sneaks around with one that's more to his liking. (For those of you who were waiting for a typical Neil LaBute male character to enter the picture, Bingo!)

But Greg is the focus here and while his attempt to patch things up with Steph is met with her attempt to publicly humiliate him, his sincerity about wanting her to be happy - whether it's with him or that great new guy she's dating - is touching. As he was Off-Broadway, Sadoski is immensely likeable in the role as Greg tries to separate himself from a world dominated by guys like Kent and make a better person of himself. The always-interesting Marin Ireland, stepping into the role for the first time, never lets us forget that Steph does care for Greg, even as screams angry accusations at him. Her active face and manner reveal her heart's battle with her pride and self-respect, knowing that no other feeling she may have can make up for the ultimate sadness of sharing her life with someone who she believes finds her unappealing. One of the production's strongest moments comes when the two of them just relax for a moment with each other and even laugh a bit, giving a bittersweet glimpse into what made their relationship last as long as it did.

The supporting players are just as effective.  Perabo is appealing humorous and perky, especially when it becomes apparent that those qualities are her character's survival tools. Pasquale, also new to the play, is uncomfortably realistic as the superficial perpetual adolescent, bluntly driving home insensitive lines that cause grownups in the audience to vocally react with disgust. ("Beautiful women are like athletes; a couple of good years then the knees go.") Director Terry Kinney brings the play closer to the warm fuzzies than any LaBute piece has ever attempted, while still bathing it in a hard-edged, rhythmic production.

While reasons to be pretty may not have anything new to say about what determines physical attractiveness and why we may find that quality important, it's still an enjoyable riff on a subject that never gets old. And for couples who bond through heated post-theatre discussions about relationship issues, it's definitely the best date night on Broadway.

So why is the title in all lower case letters? Low self-esteem, maybe?

Photos by Robert J. Saferstein: Top: Marin Ireland and Thomas Sadoski; Bottom: Steven Pasquale and Thomas Sadoski