Posted: 10/19/26 at 3:00pm
LA Times echoes most of the other reviews (with too much plot summary). Says Keery is the best performance
Julia Louis-Dreyfus debuts on Broadway in a milder, less impactful ‘Other Desert Cities’
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2026-10-19/other-desert-cities-review-julia-louis-dreyfus-debuts-broadway
"In the toned-down revival at the Hudson Theatre, John Benjamin Hickey treats the play as a Chekhovian sitcom, a strategy that ends up blunting the laughter without really deepening the pathos.
Louis-Dreyfus works to make Polly relatable, a surprising choice for one of television’s most astringent comic presences. (“Likable” is hardly the first word that comes to mind when describing Elaine from “Seinfeld” or Selina Meyer from “Veep.”)
...
While Channing understood the way a mask can become one’s actual face, Dreyfus wants the audience to know Polly’s heart. Her performance lacks the necessary comic aggression to motor Baitz’s comedy.
With his weather-beaten good looks, Harris’ Lyman makes it possible to imagine Robert Redford or Sam Shepard as an old guard Republican standard bearer. Harris is so convincing in his suave, leathery demeanor that I kept wishing the role demanded more from him — that is, until the plot thickened and the actor started fumbling for his lines. Baitz’s verbal gymnastics aren’t a good fit for Harris who is at his most eloquent when his characters are at a loss for words.
Rabe has the toughest role, and she plunges into the morass of Brooke’s rage and grief. Her theatrical intensity, however, seems at odds with the more contained manner of her fellow actors. Brooke isn’t meant to fit in, but she seems as if she’s dropped in not so much from the other coast but from another genre. Hickey fails to coalesce the disparate playing styles."
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