The Assembled Parties Broadway Reviews

There are tales, still told by the old ones of Broadway, of a time when Charm - with a capital C - was a cardinal virtue in the theater...To my great surprise, a brand-new version of such a play has materialized at the Samuel J. Friedman Theater, and it is, in a word, charming. It is also smart, sad and so impossibly well-spoken you may feel like giving up on conversation. It is called 'The Assembled Parties,' written by Richard Greenberg and featuring a leading lady, Jessica Hecht, who is charm - I mean, Charm - incarnate...'The Assembled Parties'...is an elegy to a breed of woman, a style of living and a genre of theater of which only vestiges remain in frantic, self-promoting New York. Directed with loving care by Lynne Meadow, this is an old-fashioned play that ruefully knows that its time has passed and, moreover, why it's passed.

The latest work by playwright Richard Greenberg is a beautiful and touching look at the inner workings of a well-to-do family, their mistakes and the stories that bind them...Lynne Meadow directs with superb skill, keeping the tension rising while allowing the actors all the room to show their gifts...With a breathy, calm and happy demeanor, Hecht is addictive to watch...There are few more poignant scenes than the play's final one, in which wistfulness and hope collide, thanks to some superb acting and writing. It's worth aging 20 years to see.

Basically, it's like Aaron Sorkin meets Neil Simon. That should register as studied and artificial, and on many levels it does. But the cleverness is supported by a foundation of warmth, sensitivity, even delicacy that makes this funny-sad comedy as unexpectedly affecting as it is entertaining...This is an idiosyncratic play that reveals itself slowly and perhaps never quite fully, but Lynne Meadow's expertly gauged production has just the right feel for its shifting rhythms...More than the physical production, however, what separates this from a mannered New Yorker cartoon world is the wonderful anchoring performances of Jessica Hecht and Judith Light, both of them rich in complex humanity.

Richard Greenberg's elegantly moving The Assembled Parties is somewhere between a slice of life and a slice of mille-feuille...A brisk draft of intelligence blows straight through the script, tempering moments of sentiment with astringency and surprise. In Lynne Meadow's lovely Manhattan Theatre Club staging, the first act is a whirl of quips and overlapping scenes-Santo Loquasto's ingenious set spins the stage from room to room-and the second is ominously still, shadowed by past and future death. At the center of both is Julie, played with feathery otherworldliness by Jessica Hecht in one of the year's most absorbing performances.

'The Assembled Parties,' [Richard Greenberg's] first new play here since 2006, has been lovingly directed by Lynne Meadow and cast with such experts of emotional nuance as JudithLight and Jessica Hecht. The tragicomedy, despite a few unexplained improbabilities, shocks us into realizing how hungry we have been for witty and wounded grown-ups who toss off gorgeously written observations without knowing how little we know about what we think we know.

...appearances can be deceiving in Richard Greenberg's endearing new play...By the time Act Two unfolds -- 20 years later, in the same apartment -- we have learned that these folks are all vulnerable to bad choices, the whims of fortune and the simple passing of time. That is Parties' bittersweet lesson; and in this Manhattan Theatre Club production, it is reinforced with warmth and wit by a seasoned cast nimbly directed by Lynne Meadow and led by Jessica Hecht, Judith Light and Jeremy Shamos as, respectively, Julie, Faye and Jeff, the most prominent and vivid characters...Hecht's artfully quirky performance makes it clear that Julie is both sharper and sadder than she lets on, while Light mines the gutsy fortitude behind Faye's whining.

The Assembled Parties-despite that bland title-is Greenberg's most richly emotional work in years, and the most beautifully detailed...And the director, Lynne Meadow, who is also MTC's artistic director, has given it a top-drawer mounting. She seems to have taken a cue from Jessica Hecht's heartbreaking Julie in keeping the pathos at bay as resolutely and as long as possible. When it finally insists itself-as it does, for instance, in a very quick gulp of regret handled with marvelous economy by Judith Light as Faye-it is much more painful than a weepy speech would have been. (Light mostly makes hilarious, even triumphant speeches-good practice for the Tonys.)

The beauty of Greenberg's play lies in its richness. The playwright captures the particulars of how a New York family lives and loves through the years, with special attention to the subtle differences between 1980 and 2000 (a corded phone becomes cordless!). Director Lynne Meadow's production is greatly enhanced by Santo Loquasto's turntable set, a wonder in all its intricate details. And Meadow has assembled a first-rate cast that feels as familiar and complicated as any real-life clan. As an added bonus, you may be left with an overwhelming urge to call your mother. A-

Ownership and changing fortunes are at the heart of this mystery play. It's the most engrossing to date from a writer whose work ('Take Me Out' is the best known) I usually find too self-consciously clever to be taken seriously...Nothing and everything happens in this Manhattan Theatre Club production. The strength of 'The Assembled Parties,' staged by artistic director Lynne Meadow with a fluidly involving intimacy, is the way family secrets insinuate themselves into the fabric even of lives lived independently. They penetrate the walls and overlap, and they always have unforeseen consequences.

But Light, who won a Tony last year for 'Other Desert Cities,' proves ever-invaluable as Faye, a smart-mouthed mensch with bark and bite. She's the life of the party - and this production.

Whatever headaches Richard Greenberg might be having, what with this month's closing of 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' on Broadway and next month's opening of 'Far from Heaven' at Playwrights Horizons, he can relax about 'The Assembled Parties.' The Manhattan Theater Club, with a.d. Lynne Meadow at the helm, has done a sweet job on his messy but moving domestic comi-dram about a Jewish family living - and eating and arguing - over two decades in a 14-room rent-stabilized apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

Despite this tighter focus, 'The Assembled Parties' bogs down in far-fetched tangents and revelations, as well as an unlikely story about a ruby necklace. It's not even clear why Christmas means so much to this Jewish family.

The play, which opened Wednesday night at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, is very, very funny, and, as it ends, deeply moving. What's most impressive, though, is Greenberg's command of his craft in weaving an ambitious, intricately connected tapestry of family relationships: husbands and wives, brother and sister, and, most profoundly, parents and children.

Older theatergoers especially will appreciate the tender mercies of 'The Assembled Parties.' Richard Greenberg's absorbing new family drama essentially regards people's hopes for their future and the poignant reality of how things turn out with the passage of time.

But despite its problems, “The Assembled Parties,” which observes a well-off, secular Jewish family living on the Upper West Side, is that very rare kind of play where Act Two is substantially better than Act One. In other words, do not leave at intermission, no matter how much you may want to.

Fortunately for the audience, a considerable number of Mr. Greenberg's quips are being cracked by Jessica Hecht and Judith Light, who do their damnedest. Unfortunately for the audience, that's not enough.