SIGNIFICANT OTHER Previews- Page 2

[forgetmenotnyc]

Posted: 6/17/15 at 11:20pm

I really liked this. Easy to feel lots of empathy for the characters - just not crazy about how it makes the gay male lead too pathetic. Some of the dance numbers are really masterful. I found the set creative & effectively used - but that low hanging pendant lamps purpose wasn't clear & I wonder if more scenes had taken place in the kitchen at one time so as to warrant space that wasn't used much. Maybe metaphor for the lack of substance in our lead characters personal life? I hope it gets received well by the press.

[GreasedLightning]

Posted: 6/19/15 at 11:17am

Any press reviews on this yet? It opened last night. 

[Kad]

Posted: 6/19/15 at 11:22am

Its review is the top article in the Times Theater section. It's a rave from Isherwood.
And a critic's pick.

[Kad]

Posted: 6/19/15 at 11:24am

And four stars and a critic's pick from Adam Feldman in Time Out.
Time Out NY

[newintown]

Posted: 6/19/15 at 12:42pm

It's not a badly written play; the playwright has a very good ear for dialogue. Parts of the piece kept reminding me of a better play about young women and marriage and friendship - Leslye Headland's Bachelorette from about five years ago, which was definitely darker and less of a sit-com than this one.

The major problems that prevented me from entirely accepting this particular play, though were: a) the central character is one of those nervous gay men who seems to be unable to form friendships with men, relating only to women. Now this is, of course, a real thing, but I admit that I find these guys off-putting in real life, because they don't seem to like men, but can only lust after them. b) when Jordan says that he's afraid of growing old alone, all I could think was "what kind of person in their 20s worries about growing old alone?" Not someone I'm interested in watching, I admit.

I suppose there's a c as well - it's difficult (for me) to sympathize with a guy only focusing on the physical beauty of their object of affection, ignoring personal qualities entirely; this goes back to a, in that it seems that, to this guy, women are people and other men are merely objects of physical lust (which he seems to think is the same thing as love). But this problem isn't addressed in any way in the text, which makes me wonder if the playwright has the same problem as the character.

But there's some very funny and entertaining dialogue. And it's always a treat to see Barbara Barrie.

Updated On: 6/19/15 at 12:42 PM

[DramaTeach]

Posted: 6/27/15 at 12:16am

Just got back and really enjoyed this.  Perhaps it's because I'm in the demographic (whereas a typical roundabout crowd seems to be over 65), but it all rang so true to me - insecurities, changing relationships, etc.  Found it to be very funny with a lot of raw emotion and heart.  Gideon Glick was fabulous!

[Patash]

Posted: 6/28/15 at 8:51am

Add me to the over 65 group that LOVED this play. 

I'm puzzled though by comments about not being able to identify with the main character therefore not enjoying it.  I can't identify with a man who steals a loaf of bread and spends his whole life running and trying to make amends for that -- but that doesn't mean I don't like a show about that.  Theatre takes me to places that are both familiar and unfamiliar -- and often it is the show about unfamiliar things that takes me the furthest.  I don't need to recognize the way characters behave or find them familiar enough to indentify with them to enjoy or even to be challenged by them.

And as to the thought that a 27 year old gay man is not likely to obsess about growing old alone?  Umm. Wasn't much of the play about the fact that these four people were best friends, and by the time the guy is 27 three of those friends have moved on with their lives via marriage, but now he is the only one with no one?  Wouldn't that alone be enough cause to obsess about that loneliness?  It would for me. 

 

[Stew123]

Posted: 6/30/15 at 5:02pm

Has anyone sat in the last row/partial view for this show?  Is it worth the HIPTIX price?

[Stew123]

Posted: 7/1/15 at 12:13pm

Bump...

[ClydeBarrow]

Posted: 7/1/15 at 12:14pm

I think I sat up there for the ACCESS10 tickets and the view is fine. The stage is pretty high so it's actually not bad to be in the mezzanine. The theatre is also fairly small so I don't think there's a bad seat. I'm not sure why it would be partial view though.

[Stew123]

Posted: 7/1/15 at 12:22pm

The seats are actually last row of the orchestra.

[MayAudraBlessYou2]

Posted: 7/1/15 at 12:22pm

saw this and loved it. Really wonderful work from the cast. 

I used hiptix gold, so i cant speak as to what exactly the view is from the back row, but it is likely only partial b/c of the overhang. The set is multi-leveled, but the top platforms (which i assume is somewhat cut-off) are only rarely used. Just a couple tableauxs and a few lines during a phone call. So I'd say go for it, its a small enough theatre that youll still enjoy it from the last row. A friend sat there last night and had no complaints. 

 

[Stew123]

Posted: 7/1/15 at 12:48pm

Thank you!!

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 7/12/15 at 2:23pm

Saw this on Friday and thought it was very good. The play itself has a tendency to become a bit repetitive with the three weddings, but the writing was good enough that it didn't bother me too much. On a personal level, I related to this so much. I'm a gay man who moved to New York last year, and it's certainly been a hard transition. It's such a big place, but it can be very lonely too. Plus, I have three older sisters, all of whom are married, and as the only single one left in the family I completely understood where Jordan is coming from in this play. Not having a boyfriend isn't the worst thing in the world, but when it seems like everyone around you has found someone, it's hard not to feel that frustration magnified. I also felt that the play is particularly interesting in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling. While of course it's wonderful and I'm thrilled it all turned out the right way, it is a bit strange as a single gay person because it applies you while reminding you that you still haven't found someone yet. I don't know if that was in Joshua Harmon's head while writing this, but it's a nice extra layer.

The cast was excellent all-around, and Gideon Glick carries the whole thing beautifully. He's such a mess but so charming and likeable, and his big scene with Lindsay Mendez in the second act was fantastic. Barbara Barrie was also lovely. I can understand that this play maybe isn't for everyone, but I found it pretty effective all-around and I hope it has the sort of success that Bad Jews has had all over the country.

[smidge]

Posted: 7/12/15 at 2:40pm

Has anyone heard if this may extend into September?

[haterobics]

Posted: 7/12/15 at 3:46pm

No extension. I know a cast member.

[smidge]

Posted: 7/12/15 at 4:17pm

Thank you

[wicked1492]

Posted: 7/12/15 at 4:22pm

This show fvcked me UP for a day or two. Damn.

[DramaTeach]

Posted: 7/12/15 at 4:30pm

^^ I agree.  I found this to be an affecting modern story with some truly wonderful, heartbreaking performances and lots of humor.  Most definitely a fan of this one.    

[RippedMan]

Posted: 8/7/15 at 10:52pm

Saw this tonight and really glad I did. I rather liked it. He has a great ear for dialogue, and I really loved how it was written. I do agree the show lagged a lot. Certain things weren't needed - all the grandmother scenes really seemed rather pointless? I think those could have been solved in a phone call without the grandmother there or something. But I have to echo that I'm not sure Harmon is a great playwright. I foresaw the ending far before it happened, and then he has a whole scene with his Grandmother that essentially tells us "This is how the play will end." I think it would have been more poignant if we didn't have that scene. Also, I agree with whoever said it all seemed a little to clean. The girls meet a man, marry them, have kids. But the gay guy can't seem to find anybody? Are his only options overtly-gay men who say "Hey girl" and straight men who seem gay? Those are his only options in the world? All the girls are in happy marriages? None of them get divorced? Why couldn't the play end with them all dancing, including him in their happiness. I guess that's not the play he wanted to write, but I don't think I agree with his themes, etc. 

But I'm still glad I went. And I really liked the set! I don't get why the hanging light was there or the cord showing. And I don't get why their was a scrim over everything? Or why the set was so elaborate and hardly used, but I liked looking at it. 

The acting overall was great. I thought all the characters were fairly interesting, if not somewhat the same. Are all his friends valley girl/airhead types? I guess I wasn't totally sure why he'd wanna hang with those kinda people? And Jordan came off as a pretty annoying person who is all about himself, which could lead to why he's single? 

But it's playing for another week, so I'd say it's worth checking out. If nothing else, it got me thinking. 

[RaiseYouUp]

Posted: 8/7/15 at 10:55pm

I thought it was pretty cute, but I agree, the grandma scenes were very pointless. Also the part where he yelled at Lindsay Mendez in act 2 went on waaaay too long. 

[Auggie27]

Posted: 8/8/15 at 10:04pm

I saw it this afternoon.  Agree with the consensus. The play starts so strong, the Kiki material is the tightest/strongest of the portrayals of the three friends' plights in my opinion; her beats and lines -- though broadly presented - are razor sharp. We feel early on as if this play may well leap past sit com dynamics. Early on it looks at boundaries (Kiki and her wet spanx) and what breaching those boundaries means to Jordan's other issues (see below), and then sort of abandons all of that to focus on the dynamics of dating/proposing/wedding ritual. The next two female friends are less arresting, drawn (in the writing) with slightly less pith, though Mendez -- given a lot of stage time -- makes a persuasive case for hers (wish she'd been given more comedy; she has a lot of water treading in the first act). 

The story makes a fairly daring turn -- by the "Will and Grace and Grace and Grace" set up of the front end -- midway through act two, and begins to explore somewhat deeper more timeless waters.  I wish they went still deeper. The playwrights begins to look at issues beyond not finding a partner, like how well a G, B or Q man relates to other men, when it's easier and/or more expedient to achieve emotional intimacy with women. And what's that startling revelation mean when the syndrome has been a habit pattern likely dating to childhood.  It's a rather bigger and more complicated issue than the front act tackles, giving so much stage time to the girl pals's Bridesmaid-y travails.  But when it arrives, the play's ambitions are suddenly sharper and unavoidably larger, and Glick goes for it. (If he plays the bravura aria too much at one level, at least at this point in the run; it's desperately in need of a director's notes to reshape and orchestrate it anew.  I was second row center and lost completely endings of sentences.)  And the ending -- no spoiler -- is equally daring, because it abandons sitcom completely.  It's a Company without a "Being Alive."  Or with the song unexpressed but waiting to have a cathartic motivator.

Sometimes the story reminded me -- in tone -- of Jeffrey without AIDS.  But Harmon takes the Jeffrey dilemma into another era-specific direction.  And then again, he suddenly turns a corner and this man's crisis seems much more complex than finding Mr. Right or Right/now. Jordan doesn't know how to simply slow down and talk to another man, nor how to locate one who is appropriate.  Timeless, and ageless, and here it's presented as emotionally isolating. What is sitcom plot fodder for 90 minutes is rendered as a more character-specific, less generic problems. A very interesting question is thus asked -- what's the way out of this -- and the play wisely offers no easy answers.    

Barrie was out, but Alice Cannon was lovely and obviously has gone on before (she was with Barrie in Company, speaking of that show).  I like the scenes, and per my comment above, see how even they are related to Jordan's bigger issue. But they do run on.   

 

 

Updated On: 8/8/15 at 10:04 PM

[Auggie27]

Posted: 8/8/15 at 10:09pm

I wonder if more scenes had taken place in the kitchen at one time so as to warrant space that wasn't used much. Maybe metaphor for the lack of substance in our lead characters personal life?"

There's a very shrewd question.  I thought the set was very odd. Not terribly well used. Upstage is a peculiar netherworld where everyone but Jordan retreats; the middle depth devoted to intricately realized interiors that were barely even explored, and two those massive aluminum staircases.  (Why?) Yet most of the play is played downstage right/left, on benches and un-propped chairs.  Very strange.  I didn't know where we were. It's a busy set, not terribly evocative, and it has bizarre and massive lighting pieces -- those East Room of the White House chandeliers and full blown streetlights -- that hover over everything.   I'd say it's over designed (if attractive) and weighs the play down.  

Updated On: 8/8/15 at 10:09 PM

[RippedMan]

Posted: 8/8/15 at 10:47pm

I can easily see this being done in regional theaters on a much simplier/smaller scale. 

[EthelMae]

Posted: 8/8/15 at 11:04pm

Barbara Barrie was out when I saw this past Wed. Mat. Now I read she was out today too. Wonder if she is out for the rest of the run- which is only next week. I've seen it 3 times now and just really like it-the writing and the actors. If anyone in the know knows if Barrie is not coming back-I'd like to know cause I plan on seeing it one more time. I saw her the first time but she was out the last two times. Her understudy is terrific but I'd like to see Ms. Barrie one last time. Thx.