Old Times Previews- Page 3

[LightsOut90]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 2:29am

Saw this tonight, while the performance are generally good, the play itself is terrible and so thin, this production shows everything wrong with roundabout right now, poor programming choices, and obsession with british plays, and white, white white Todd REALLY needs to retire as Artistic Director. 

Also while it turned between scenes it seems they have cut the idea of the turntable constantly moving during the show as it was static for most of the night.

My audience also didn't give it a standing ovation and the applause was generally polite, i can't remember the last time i stared at my watch during a show, what a long 70 minutes. 

[nicnyc]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 7:29am

I saw this last night - and Kad, I think you hit the nail on the head on this one. Frustratingly opaque is exactly the phrase I would have used to describe it.  Clive Owen's unearned emotional outburst drew some inappropriate nervous laughter from the audience. I have studied Pinter & really enjoy it and more often than not enjoy Clive Owen's work & choice of projects - so I was pretty pre inclined to find something redeeming in it - and I could not. You were also quite correct about the subscribers, if last night was any indication.  I was in the center section, row C, and counted at least 7 people who slept through the majority of the show - they only woke up when the lights flashed at them again in the ending sequence.  The applause seemed polite - and many people could be heard on the way out saying they had no idea what they saw - and, even worse, that they didn't care to know - they just wanted it to end. Many people were complaining to the ushers both before and after the show about the incidental music - the ushers were sympathetic saying they hated it too & thought it was way too loud pre-show but that it was "part of the production".  Very sad a production with these kind of issues is Clive Owen's Broadway debut.  I'd been looking forward to this for weeks and it was a real let down to see such a wasted opportunity.

[little_sally]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 10:01am

I haven't seen this yet (going Saturday) but I wonder why Roundabout picked this play this season. Nobody was clamoring for a revival of Old Times. Is  it because Clive Owen wanted to do it?

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 10:23am

The best thing about this was the slab of ice as it has no lines. It reminded me  2001 . I recall years ago Mad did a parody of it calling it "2001 Minutes Of A Space Idiocy". 2001 was incomprehensible and so was the show.Both had slabs and both made no sense.

 

People were indeed falling asleep at the performance we attended.The critics should have a ball with this.

Updated On: 9/30/15 at 10:23 AM

[wickedfan11]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 10:52am

How is the merchandise?

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 10:58am

Like the show - a big nothing.

[wonkit]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 10:43pm

I was at today's matinee. First of all, I love Pinter and I know this play very well even though this is the first time I have seen it in performance. The audience was attentive, and there was a nice response, if not overwhelming, at the end of the performance. There was a lot of discussion afterwards in the lobby - and most people had at least an opinion about what they had seen rather than an outright rejection.

I did not think it was a "bad" performance at all, although it was ultimately disappointing. Let me start with what I didn't like at all: the music and the set. The pre-curtain music is very loud and very irritating which probably means it is doing what the production intended: aggravate the listener and accentuate the silence that follows. But the fact that the music came back as underscoring during the performance really drove me nuts because Pinter isn't the kind of work where you want music to give you a hint about what you should be feeling! And the set - ugly, distracting, symbolic. Again, not the sort of thing I associate with Pinter. The revival of THE HOMECOMING as few years back had the perfect Pinter set: quite ordinary, drab and detailed and realistic, to contrast with the human curiosities occurring in it. It really isn't Beckett or Sartre.

Now for the actors. No glaring deficiencies but no feeling that any one of the participants was born to play the part either. How can I explain this? They all played the pauses, and the silences, perfectly. Very natural - the searching for the right word, trying decide whether to lie or not, trying to wait out the hearers and maybe not give an answer at all. What didn't work was the spoken text. I expected to hear each character speaking differently to each of the other two, and the tone of the performance seemed to be too uniform as though it were, in fact, what it appears to be on its surface: three people in an awkward kind of reunion. It started out well - Eve Best's first speech, the wild excited ramble about what it was like to be young and poor in London, contrasted beautifully with the monosyllables that preceded it. But then it started to feel routine. Perhaps a little too fast, as an earlier poster noted? If this is a play about the tricks of memory, there ought to be a pacing issue to remind us that we are not being told the truth and the characters may not be consciously lying. If the entire play had the impact of Kelly Reilly's final speech - no spoilers here  - I might have felt more satisfied. 

So - it may be worked out over time, but it doesn't quite come together. My guess is that Douglas Hodge may not have figured out how to help his actors use the discomfort that Pinter loves so much. I kept getting the sense of "Really everything is fine, isn't it darling" rather than "How can you possibly think that is what I meant?"

If I got a free ticket, I would go back later in the run just to test my reaction. But this was a pricey buy-in for me, so I'll leave well enough alone for now.

And I do love Pinter - every word is there for a reason.

[JBroadway]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 10:53pm

Mr. Roxy says:

"People on either side of us were scratching their heads at the end basically asking each other what the hell happened on the stage."

 

"People were standing up looking at each other to see if anyone else knew what just went on."

 

"People were indeed falling asleep at the performance we attended.The critics should have a ball with this."

 

"Maybe this show will signal the end of obligatory standing ovations at the end of each show. This show did not deserve one."

 

"A friend of ours saw it today. He did not care for it nor did the person he went with."

 
"Audience reaction at the end was the same as when we went - a lot of head scratching and wtf moments."

 

Roxy, your 6 separate comments saying "I wasn't the only person who hated it," were not all necessary. We get it. I have no problem with people expressing negative opinions, but you seem inordinately passionate about trashing it, and making sure we all know that you're not alone in your opinion. 

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 11:29pm

And no one else trashes shows endlessly? Give me a break.

 

From now on, I will say " I did not care for it" and leave it at that so as not to offend those with thin skin. Now we have that cleared up we can all sleep soundly.

[JBroadway]

Posted: 9/30/15 at 11:38pm

I don't care if you trash a show. You just don't need to REPEAT yourself so much is all, especially in one thread. 

[little_sally]

Posted: 10/3/15 at 7:05pm

I was at today's matinee and I'm still digesting it. I didn't hate it, as I do most Pinter, and I thought the performances and direction were strong. I also liked the set and music. The 70 minutes really did seem to fly by. But it was still Pinter, and still somewhat tedious and incomprehensible but I came home and read some analysis of it and think it's kind of fascinating. But it doesn't make for great theater.

[musicman_bwayfan]

Posted: 10/3/15 at 8:08pm

Do they have merch in yet? Specifically, the posters?

[little_sally]

Posted: 10/3/15 at 8:19pm

I did notice t-shirts but didn't notice a poster (I wasn't looking for them in particular, sorry) but there is merch so perhaps?

[musicman_bwayfan]

Posted: 10/10/15 at 11:42pm

Updated On: 10/24/15 at 11:42 PM

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 10/24/15 at 5:25pm

I am a little late to the game here. I saw Old Times this afternoon. I found the 70 minutes to be tedious and boring beyond belief. The surrealist scenic design did not work for me at all. I was in the second to last row of the mezzanine, and a lot of the dialogue was incomprehensible, especially from Clive Owen. Thank god this play was short. This was my first Pinter play I have seen, and I think it is safe to say that he is just simply not for me.