Ben Brantley at the New York Times is
a Rave:
'Mr. Piven has the pivotal role, and he executes it with uncanny grace and intelligence. A three-time Emmy winner as the amoral über-agent on “Entourage,” he would be a natural for the hungry-like-a-wolf Charlie. But here he mines a subtler vein, letting you glimpse the genuine, self-questioning weariness beneath Bobby’s macho bravado. Far more than Charlie, this Bobby knows he’s playing a part, a perception that could be fatal.
In contrast, Mr. Esparza runs full speed ahead with his ambition-stoked character, tapping the full kinetic force he artfully kept under wraps in recent revivals of “Company” and “The Homecoming.” But while Charlie may be an animal in perpetual fight-or-flight mode, Mr. Esparza finds many shades and textures — of pride, humiliation, anger and resentment — within that primal instinct. And the portrayal of the shifting alpha-male status between Charlie and Bobby should be mandatory viewing for sociologists and, come to think of it, zoologists.
Ms. Moss is best known for playing another ambitious secretary (turned copywriter) in a testosterone-drenched world, on the AMC series “Mad Men.” But she definitely doesn’t just repeat what she does on television. When Madonna played Karen — as woodenly as she was to play most subsequent parts — she got a pass from the critics, who said that her role was too enigmatic to do much with. Ms. Moss proves the lie in that assessment, bringing a naked clarity to her unvarnished, tinny-voiced Karen that makes the play hang together in ways it didn’t before.'
http://theater2.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/theater/reviews/24plow.html
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
Updated On: 10/24/08 at 10:22 PM
