Review Roundup: STRATEGIC LOVE PLAY, Starring Heléne Yorke and Michael Zegen

The New York premiere of Strategic Love Play, starring Heléne Yorke and Michael Zegen, is now being presented by Audible. Written by Miriam Battye and directed by Katie Posner, Strategic Love Play arrives in New York following a sold-out run at the 2023 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, a UK tour, and two sold-out runs at London’s Soho Theatre. Strategic Love Play was originally produced by Paines Plough, Soho Theatre, and Belgrade Theatre, in association with Landmark Theatres.
 
After matching online, two strangers – Heléne Yorke and Michael Zegen – meet in real life. The vibe is off, and the conversation is a mess. Yet something is keeping them in their seats. What begins as a typical date off the apps spirals into something unexpected in a bold new production of Strategic Love Play, the show that sold out in London and took the Edinburgh Fringe by storm. 

Check out what the critics are saying about the New York premiere below!
 

Photo Credit: Joan Marcus 

Gillian Russo, New York Theatre Guide: Strategic Love Play is like a good first date that nonetheless lacks a spark — it's not memorable enough for a second round, but a pleasant time while you're there, largely due in part to Yorke and Zegen's individual excellence and common chemistry.

Deb Miller, DC Theater Arts: Produced by Audible, Inc. and Chase This Production, the live performance of Strategic Love Play, with its humorous and contrary characterizations by the excellent Zegen and Yorke, will also be recorded and released at a later date on Audible, so if you can’t make it to Minetta Lane, you can listen to the audio version of the play at home and around the world, and find out if the time is right for them to heal their wounds and open themselves up to honesty, trust, and love again.

Cameron Kelsall, Exeunt: Unfortunately, clichés abound throughout this thin exploration of conscious coupledom, directed with regrettably slack rhythms by Katie Posner. The romantic comedy genre is not an endlessly deep well, but it feels as if we’ve encountered every plot point under a more interesting guise before. Jenny (Heléne Yorke), staring down the barrel of another year alone, tries desperately to convince herself that love requires compromise. Adam (Michael Zegen), a prototypical nice guy, pines for a female friend now married to a man of whom he doesn’t approve. In the script, the characters are called simply “Woman” and “Man,” perhaps in a nod to universality—but it also underscores the lack of specificity or personality in much of Battye’s writing.

Thom Geier, Culture Sauce: Yorke is a bit too loud, abrasive, and quick to laugh at her jokes — and she upsets the norms and rhythms of courtship that we’ve come to expect from decades of rom-coms. We can see it in Zegen’s stuttering responses, his self-conscious rubbing of his hands up and down his pant legs, and the way that she keeps throwing him off his game while still sparking his interest. Not that this guy has much rizz. He’s a self-described “nice normal person” who says he works at Mount Sinai, but immediately fesses up that he’s an auditor and not a doctor, who quickly admits he used a fake name on his profile, and who blurts out details about his most recent ex, a woman who dumped him after 16 months who remains a rent-free tenant in his brain.

James Wilson, Talkin' Broadway: Yorke, who has received excellent notices in HBO Max's "The Other Two" and was a memorable Olive in the musical Bullets Over Broadway, and Zegen, who is best known as Joe Maisel in "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" and was quite good in Trouble in Mind on Broadway a few seasons back, create believable character arcs. They gently peel back the layers of pain left by past relationships. As potential lovers, though, Yorke and Zegen lack the requisite sparks. Their jabs and stabs, particularly early in the play, are devoid of sexual tension, and it isn't plausible that one or both hadn't left after the first drink. Regrettably, this is a blind date that seemed doomed from the first swipe.