LITTLE BEAR RIDGE ROAD Reviews

10pm review drop.

NYT Critic's Pick from Laura Collins-Hughes

Critic’s Pick

Laurie Metcalf Is Riveting in ‘Little Bear Ridge Road’

The playwright Samuel D. Hunter makes his Broadway debut with an addition to his Idaho oeuvre, set during the Covid-19 pandemic and its aftermath.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/30/theater/little-bear-ridge-road-review-metcalf.html

Hunter, a prolific Off Broadway playwright with an oeuvre of works set in Idaho (“A Case for the Existence of God,” “Grangeville” ), is making his Broadway debut with “Little Bear Ridge Road,” which had its premiere last year at Steppenwolf Theater Company in Chicago. Its transfer declares the Broadway resurrection of the exiled-for-a-while producer Scott Rudin. (Allegations of bullying in 2021 led to widespread denunciations.) And honestly? Everything about this impeccable production, presented by Rudin and the media mogul Barry Diller, exudes the nearly flawless taste that Rudin is famous for.

Updated On: 10/30/25 at 10:01 PM

Vulture

You Won’t Take Your Eyes Off Laurie Metcalf in Little Bear Ridge Road

https://www.vulture.com/article/theater-review-samuel-hunter-laurie-metcalf-little-bear-ridge-road.html

"Hunter stretches, too, to weld the play’s interest in the act of watching television to stargazing. That occupies (as long as we’re thinking in TV terms) a B-plot in which Ethan ends up flirting with a local astrophysicist played by John Drea. (They meet on an app, though you would better understand the characters’ expectations if it specified whether it’s akin to Tinder or more like Sniffies.) Their budding romance contains echoes of other Hunter plays—there’s a fight about money very much like one in Clarkston, and the feeling of a relationship pulled taut by one partner’s stasis, à la Grangeville—yet I found it difficult to connect to. Stock and Drea are charming together, and their flirtation in Mantello’s direction feels like a cozy web comic, but you keep waiting for Hunter to plunge the characters into something deeper than a fight over whether to leave town for a Ph.D. program or a rumination of how looking out at the night sky makes you feel small. Mostly, you’re just waiting for Laurie Metcalf to come back onstage."

3 1/2 from NYP

‘Little Bear Ridge Road’ review: Laurie Metcalf bares her soul in moving Broadway play

https://nypost.com/2025/10/30/entertainment/little-bear-ridge-road-review-laurie-metcalf-bares-her-soul-in-moving-broadway-play

Variety

‘Little Bear Ridge Road’ Review: Laurie Metcalf Shines in a Flawed but Fascinating COVID Story

https://variety.com/2025/legit/reviews/little-bear-ridge-road-laurie-metcalf-review-1236562382

"there are elements here that don’t quite gel. Hunter, in writing a protagonist not dissimilar from ones he has written in the past, uses at first a sort of shorthand — Ethan is unhappy because, well, what’s to be happy about? — but as details of Ethan’s life accrue, elements (including and especially his life in Seattle) strain credulity. Ethan is, we are told, dreaming of becoming a writer, and yet his mien never struck this viewer as particularly writerly or reflective: Stock gives a performance that is emphatic to a fault. Every word he utters is capitalized."

The Wrap

‘Little Bear Ridge Road’ Broadway Review: Laurie Metcalf Is Our Greatest Curmudgeon Who Delights

Samuel D. Hunter’s new play enthralls with its wise-cracking dialogue, but lags when it turns serious

https://www.thewrap.com/little-bear-ridge-road-broadway-review-laurie-metcalf-micah-stock

"If a self-professed loser like Ethan, who’s a failed writer and makes a habit of showing off his portly gut, can attract not only a corporate lawyer but a guy who is studying to be an astrophysicist, why is anyone living anywhere but the country’s northwest, where, according to “Little Bear Ridge Road,” anyone can score? Maybe Hunter made this featured character a future astrophysicist because it allows James to deliver very deep and equally dull statements about the cosmos, in particular, Orion’s Belt. Unfortunately, all this humorless talk about the stars is a lot less interesting than anything Ethan and Sarah say to lacerate each other. Suddenly, where is the Mantello of the play’s first third? Why let this scene turn pathetically sweet?

The Orion’s Belt comments prefigure all sorts of big discussions to come about cancer and meth addiction and child abuse. They are the same tropes that other, lesser playwrights stick in their plays to give them meaning. Myself, I was happier when “Little Bear Ridge Road” wasn’t pretending to be anything more than a hilarious comedy about yet another dysfunctional family."

Washington Post

You want to see Laurie Metcalf playing the world’s most abrasive aunt

“Little Bear Ridge Road” on Broadway is a subtly wrenching drama powered by Metcalf’s stunning performance.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/theater/2025/10/30/little-bear-ridge-road-broadway-review/

"The production, which originated at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company last year, is foremost a stunning vehicle for Laurie Metcalf, unrivaled as an avatar for working-class grit and staggeringly good here. It also marks a return to Broadway for producer Scott Rudin, who stepped away from the business in April 2021 following an investigation of his alleged bullying and abusive behavior. Mantello and Metcalf are both frequent collaborators of Rudin’s (co-producing here with Barry Diller), and “Little Bear Ridge Road” is the sort of polished, serious drama he’s known for. Metcalf is so thrillingly alive and persuasive in the part that you can’t help but lean into the uneasiness suspended in the air, onstage and off."

Say hello to Tony nomination #7, Laurie Metcalf.

Well deserved! Congrats to all!

EDSOSLO858 said: "Say hello to Tony nomination #7, Laurie Metcalf."

I know it’s a hot year for plays and play revivals, but if Metcalf doesn’t get a nomination for this, I will RIOT. She’s currently in a potential pool with Lesley Manville, Taraji P. Henson, Ayo Edibiri, Carrie Coon, June Squibb, Rose Byrne, and Kelli O’ Hara.

Adding here since the show isn't in previews. (The fact that no one's had anything to say about it in a month and a half likely indicates why it's closing.)

LITTLE BEAR RIDGE ROAD Will Close Early on Broadway

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/LITTLE-BEAR-RIDGE-ROAD-Will-Close-Early-on-Broadway-20251212

MemorableUserName said: "Adding here since the show isn't in previews. (The fact that no one's had anything to say about it in a month and a half likely indicates why it's closing.)

LITTLE BEAR RIDGE ROAD Will Close Early on Broadway

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/LITTLE-BEAR-RIDGE-ROAD-Will-Close-Early-on-Broadway-20251212"



^ lol what was the point of this except to be obnoxious? Some of yall are annoying as hell, I swear.

Updated On: 12/12/25 at 11:59 AM

Huss417 said: "MemorableUserName said: "Adding here since the show isn't in previews. (The fact that no one's had anything to say about it in a month and a half likely indicates why it's closing.)

LITTLE BEAR RIDGE ROAD Will Close Early on Broadway

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/LITTLE-BEAR-RIDGE-ROAD-Will-Close-Early-on-Broadway-20251212"

Being discussed in the previews thread if interested.

https://forum.broadwayworld.com/thread/LITTLE-BEAR-RIDGE-ROAD-Previews"

Which is why I said "Adding here since the show isn't in previews."

And considering how typically nasty that discussion got almost from the start a different, and accurate, thread may be welcome for some. To each their own.