From Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tracy Letts (August: Osage County) and Tony Award-winning director David Cromer (Prayer for the French Republic, The Band's Visit) comes the Broadway premiere of Steppenwolf’s acclaimed staging of a cult classic about an unexpected and intense romance between a lonely waitress (Carrie Coon) and a mysterious drifter (Namir Smallwood). What begins as a simple connection between two broken people in a seedy Oklahoma motel room twists into something far more dangerous. When reality slips out of grasp, paranoia, delusion, and conspiracy take over in this sexy psychological thriller. The New York Times warns, "Buckle up and brace yourself because Bug is obscenely exciting."
The performance is forceful enough for this Bug to operate chiefly as a character study. Despite the cesspits of conspiracy-think that pollute contemporary politics, the specific paranoia of Letts’s characters — bugs under the skin, brainwashing, nefarious doctors in government labs — feels less blazingly relevant than comparatively quaint. At the same time, because Cromer and his designers opt to keep the audience at a remove from Peter and Agnes’s folie à deux, the monsters they behold don’t ever truly spook us. They are shadows only, never claws and flesh. In such a production, the fantasy at the story’s center can’t become contagious. We bear witness to two sad, mad people. We don’t question our own sanity.
“Bug” is as intimate as it is intense. The set, designed by Takeshi Kata, drops the audience right into this specific place and time. The lightning, helmed by Heather Gilbert, and the sound, spearheaded by Josh Schmidt, also keep the play tightly grounded, though the production may have worked even better in a smaller theater. Additionally, midway through Act II, there is a shocking set change that reveals just how deep into their psychosis Agnes and Peter have sunk. Moreover, amid Agnes and Peter’s continued descent toward insanity, the story remains convincing because of the characters’ obvious affection and mutual obsession. It’s pretty apparent they are causing each other immense harm. However, their actions stem from a place of love, companionship, humor and understanding, which makes the tale especially heartbreaking.
| 2004 | Off-Broadway |
Off-Broadway |
| 2026 | Broadway |
Broadway |
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