STRAIGHT WHITE MEN Previews- Page 6

[smidge]

Posted: 7/5/18 at 7:27pm

Scarlett Johansson will be taking over the role.

[Elegance101]

Posted: 7/5/18 at 7:43pm

smidge said: "Scarlett Johansson will be taking over the role."

She'd be more right for it than her most recent announcement, honestly.

[jbird5]

Posted: 7/5/18 at 9:00pm

10086sunset said: "Happy for Payne.
He deserves the opportunity. "

I thought Payne was perfect in the role.  Not sure what more Arndt would have brought to it other then a Tony Nom.

[RippedMan]

Posted: 7/6/18 at 12:54am

Wonder if it's just a matter of learning the lines? Can't imagine either of the 2 guys are hard to work with. 

[10086sunset]

Posted: 7/7/18 at 12:21am

Anyone know what happened with Arndt?

[JayG 2]

Posted: 7/8/18 at 6:21am

The play is a mess. Not a bore, but sloppily written and unbelievable.

[Jonathan Cohen]

Posted: 7/8/18 at 11:57am

I don't know why Denis Arndt left, but it did strike me that what made his performance in Heisenberg so powerful was how grounded and lived in it felt, and I'm not sure given what was written and how Straight White Men was written that could have been possible here. 

I saw Straight White Men yesterday and was really frustrated by how interchangeable, and unconvincing the characters were as people.  When they weren't talking about white male privilege, which especially in the beginning of the play there was no realistic reason to come up (the world would probably be a better place if straight white males talked this much about their privilege unprompted, but come on), the sons were all immature rough housing nine years old, instead of middle aged men. I'm not saying middle aged men can't act immature, but for instance, the character of Jake had two kids and at no point, did the kids grandfather or uncles express any interest in talking about them... other when Drew points out Jake is a hypocrite because he wouldn't be okay if his kids grew up to be 'losers'. 

Young Jean Lee clearly had things she wanted to say about white male identity and privilege, which is great, but I didn't think she was particularly successful engaging that conversation from the straight white male perspective. For instance, I've read some interviews with her about the play, and among the challenges she faced was trying to write a play about what straight white males talk about when they're alone even though she's never witnessed that, writing about sibling when she's an only child, and this being her first time writing in a three act structure. 

To work around this issue, she had the original actors improv stuff, to understand how straight white males talk and think and incorporating that into the script. While this approach might have yielded such insights as men would rather be cold in a room than go put on a sweater, it appears there were blindspots in identifying stuff all people would do, such as a grandparent expressing interest in their grandchildren. 

I think the central problem in this crowdsourcing method of researching the play is the character of Matt; who's the unintentional antagonist of the play, by not showing ambition and by possibly being depressed. Young Jean Lee created the character by asking a bunch of people who weren't straight white men what they'd like a straight white man to be like, and that became Matt. But she eventually had to take out an explanation for why Matt was acting the way he was because any explanation just made the audience hate him. Now I don't know what the thrown out explanation/s were, but it would appear to me Young Jean Lee wrote an entire play around a conflict, she could never find a realistic motivation for.   

 

 

 

   

 

[YouDon'tClimbTrees?]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:08pm

I saw this last night at 7pm (the Sunday July 8th performance). Was anyone else here at that show? There was a constant tapping noise throughout and I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Somewhere in the audience, orchestra section...

[Jonathan Cohen]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:12pm

YouDon'tClimbTrees? said: "I saw this last night at 7pm (the Sunday July 8th performance). Was anyone else here at that show? There was a constant tapping noise throughout and I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Somewhere in the audience, orchestra section..."

I don't know, but I was there for the Saturday matinee and in the balcony there was a weird echo from what I'm assuming was the speakers coming from the right side of the theater. 

 

 

[YouDon'tClimbTrees?]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:15pm

There was a weird echo at my performance, too. Someone near me had a hearing device and I think there was a lot of static and feedback coming out of it. It was very distracting. That, plus the weird tapping sound.

[quizking101]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:37pm

YouDon'tClimbTrees? said: "I saw this last night at 7pm (the Sunday July 8th performance). Was anyone else here at that show? There was a constant tapping noise throughout and I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Somewhere in the audience, orchestra section..."

I didn't hear anything and I was in the second row mezzanine. I was really pissed that this one girl couldn't hold her functions for the last seven minutes of the play and made my mother and I (who are quite large and obvious) get up during the quieter moments toward the ending.

In regards to the show, the messages were a bit muddled for me and requires some afterthought and discussion. I have a background in gender studies from college and I was able to pick up on a lot of what the author was trying to put down (mostly about the catch-22 of not adhering to privileged heteromasculine scripts, which can be seen as a use of privilege in and of itself).

 

Click Here To Toggle Spoiler Content

The preshow was certainly strange, but when Ty DeFoe and T.L Thompson (on for Kate Bornstein) explained it after the fact, I thought it was quite funny, if a bit ham-fisted.

The cast was, for the most part, uniformly excellent and funny. There were A LOT of jokes where you felt slightly uncomfortable outright guffawing at, but it was witty and incisive, especially the "Oklahoma" bit. I actually loved the set with the picture frame that was gilded with the play's title at the bottom.

My biggest beef was the incredibly awkward way they did the transitions. Having the stagehands come out and change the scenes seems to grind the proceedings to a halt. Why not just have the "Persons In Charge" do it instead? It would give them something more to do.

[EllieRose2]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:44pm

Perhaps they don't like being directed by a woman?  Just a shot in the dark. That would be funny considering they talk about white, male privilege a lot.  I love the Second Stage Theater's website.  They only have the son's pictures, because they are sick of changing the Father every 3 days.  

https://2st.com/shows/current-production/straight-white-men

Updated On: 7/9/18 at 03:44 PM

[Jonathan Cohen]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:56pm

quizking101 said: "

 

Click Here To Toggle Spoiler Content

The preshow was certainly strange, but when Ty DeFoe and T.L Thompson (on for Kate Bornstein) explained it after the fact, I thought it was quite funny, if a bit ham-fisted.

The cast was, for the most part, uniformly excellent and funny. There were A LOT of jokes where you felt slightly uncomfortable outright guffawing at, but it was witty and incisive, especially the "Oklahoma" bit. I actually loved the set with the picture frame that was gilded with the play's title at the bottom.

My biggest beef was the incredibly awkward way they did the transitions. Having the stagehands come out and change the scenes seems to grind the proceedings to a halt. Why not just have the "Persons In Charge" do it instead? It would give them something more to do."

Then you go from having the minorities from being the "Persons In Charge" to being the hired help cleaning up after the straight white men. It's a different connotation.  

[ScottyDoesn'tKnow2]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 3:59pm

I remember reading about that forgotten show Brooklyn about how one character dies very early on in the show (very much like Fantine in Les Miz) and for the rest of the show she is in the background and does nothing but moves the set along. The joke was that they hoped they gave her a stagehand paycheck as well.

[quizking101]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 11:43pm

Jonathan Cohen said: "quizking101 said: "

 

Click Here To Toggle Spoiler Content

The preshow was certainly strange, but when Ty DeFoe and T.L Thompson (on for Kate Bornstein) explained it after the fact, I thought it was quite funny, if a bit ham-fisted.

The cast was, for the most part, uniformly excellent and funny. There were A LOT of jokes where you felt slightly uncomfortable outright guffawing at, but it was witty and incisive, especially the "Oklahoma" bit. I actually loved the set with the picture frame that was gilded with the play's title at the bottom.

My biggest beef was the incredibly awkward way they did the transitions. Having the stagehands come out and change the scenes seems to grind the proceedings to a halt. Why not just have the "Persons In Charge" do it instead? It would give them something more to do."

Then you go from having the minorities from being the "Persons In Charge" to being the hired help cleaning up after the straight white men. It's a different connotation."

Touche. I actually never would've thought about it that way.

[Phantom4ever]

Posted: 7/9/18 at 11:57pm

Saw Straight White Men last night and I am disappointed I wasted a slot on it.

The show seemed to be a VERY early draft of what one day might possibly be a good play with compelling message. The way the brothers carried on so much as goofballs was not funny to me, a gay white man, possibly because I grew up around these kind of guys (the BROS) and still interact with them on occasion and I find them insufferable. It is worth noting that the entire theater thought that it was an out-and-out laugh riot to have grown men play fight, repeatedly mock-sing songs in each other's faces, etc. I did not find any humor in that stuff at all. 

I agree with the poster who said that there were so many details in the show that never went anywhere, so many ideas left undeveloped and ignored. Worst of all was the one brother (who the heck remembers these asinine characters' names) who cried at dinner. They spend pretty much the rest of the show screaming at each other about why he was crying. Do we ever find out why he was crying?  Wanna guess! And is the playwright legit going to ask the audience to empathize with straight white men through this? Is she trying to say hey look audience! This straight white guy is sad too! And these other straight white guys have conflict in their lives! I bet you thought their lives were just privilege and racism, didn't you!  

I was waiting for that a-ha moment, whether it was uplifting or depressing, but it never came. And oh my goodness the absolute randomness of the People in Charge? Now I am a a Lefty Liberal as much as anybody else, and I loved how the audience cheered on their queer, nonbinary, gender norm-busting speech. However, it seemed completely removed from the rest of the show. So much more could have been done here, and it seems like this was rushed to Broadway before the playwright thought through any of the ideas. I got reminded of the Golden Girls episode when the girls go to an art exhibit and the artist makes up all this nonsense about his art piece and the girls pretend to understand it, and then he exposes them as frauds. This play seems like it is forcing people to go "ohhhhhh so it's saying that privileged white guys........aren't totally privileged but they still have privilege compared to most minorities something something buzzword transgender something Donald Trump something gay rights something Asian female playwright something intersectionality something did I use enough buzzwords yet?"  But in the end, the play is just that old artist from the Golden Girls who exposed us all as frauds. 

[YouDon'tClimbTrees?]

Posted: 7/10/18 at 8:25am

Phantom4ever said: "Saw Straight White Men last night and I am disappointed I wasted a slot on it.

The show seemed to be a VERY early draft of what one day might possibly be a good play with compelling message. The way the brothers carried on so much as goofballs was not funny to me, a gay white man, possibly because I grew up around these kind of guys (the BROS) and still interact with them on occasion and I find them insufferable. It is worth noting that the entire theater thought that it was an out-and-out laugh riot to have grown men play fight, repeatedly mock-sing songs in each other's faces, etc. I did not find any humor in that stuff at all.

I agree with the poster who said that there were so many details in the show that never went anywhere, so many ideas left undeveloped and ignored. Worst of all was the one brother (who the heck remembers these asinine characters' names) who cried at dinner. They spend pretty much the rest of the show screaming at each other about why he was crying. Do we ever find out why he was crying? Wanna guess! And is the playwright legit going to ask the audience to empathize with straight white men through this? Is she trying to say hey look audience! This straight white guy is sad too! And these other straight white guys have conflict in their lives! I bet you thought their lives were just privilege and racism, didn't you!

I was waiting for that a-ha moment, whether it was uplifting or depressing, but it never came. And oh my goodness the absolute randomness of the People in Charge? Now I am a a Lefty Liberal as much as anybody else, and I loved how the audience cheered on their queer, nonbinary, gender norm-busting speech. However, it seemed completely removed from the rest of the show. So much more could have been done here, and it seems like this was rushed to Broadway before the playwright thought through any of the ideas. I got reminded of the Golden Girls episode when the girls go to an art exhibit and the artist makes up all this nonsense about his art piece and the girls pretend to understand it, and then he exposes them as frauds. This play seems like it is forcing people to go "ohhhhhh so it's saying that privileged white guys........aren't totally privileged but they still have privilege compared to most minorities something something buzzword transgender something Donald Trump something gay rights something Asian female playwright something intersectionality something did I use enough buzzwords yet?" But in the end, the play is just that old artist from the Golden Girls who exposed us all as frauds."

I was at the same performance as you and I agree with your assessment 100%. Spot on! Your Golden Girls reference made me laugh out loud. And, believe it or not, I thought of the exact same episode after this play ended. Were you in my brain? Wow, that's a coincidence. Great post, thank you for validating my reaction to this play. I wanted to love it. I really did. As much as I love Armie Hammer and am currently obsessed with "Call Me By Your Name," I disliked every moment of this play. I was hoping that seeing it would make me get over my crush on the man. Surprisingly, it almost did. That only lasted for about 20 minutes, though. Now I'm back to dreaming about Elio and Oliver all day long. But I digress...

[#1Elphie]

Posted: 7/11/18 at 9:52pm

They need to change the Playbill for a third time, because this is the current cover (and Denis Arndt is still listed inside as well of course; there was an insert for Stephen Payne). This is from tonight's performance.



I enjoyed the performances, but I struggled to understand the message. I thought the preshow/framing device could have been further developed and integrated. It's hard to put my finger on what exactly I didn't like about it (and I didn't even dislike it, I just didn't feel like it made a clear point), but others have done a much better job expressing the problems with it. 

Updated On: 7/11/18 at 09:52 PM

[YouDon'tClimbTrees?]

Posted: 7/12/18 at 7:40am

Someone called it a "black comedy." I honestly didn't find any of it remotely humorous and the darkness that was very hastily thrown in there was never fully explored. Also, I didn't care about any of the characters. It's really a shame because I was so excited going in. I wonder if they're going to change anything before it opens. And how will the critics react? And I was wondering -- what's in it for Armie Hammer? 

[Kad]

Posted: 7/12/18 at 11:37am

I am surprised people are treating this as though it's a brand-new work. It's several years old and has been produced around the country, and was well-received by the Times in 2014. (even though Lee has revised it for Broadway).

"Ms. Lee’s mournful and inquisitive play leaves us with the disturbing idea that while unhappiness and a lack of achievement may be causes for sympathy, being at peace with this is an offense that cannot and will not be borne, perhaps even by the people who love you most. "

[YouDon'tClimbTrees?]

Posted: 7/12/18 at 11:40am

Ah, no wonder I saw Austin Pendleton in the audience. Perhaps that was a better production of the play. I can't imagine anyone calling this one "mournful" or "inquisitive."

[markypoo]

Posted: 7/16/18 at 12:15pm

At 63, I've had many, many occasions of being proved wrong, but that constant grinding sound inside my head could be the critics busily sharpening their knives for this one.

[YouDon'tClimbTrees?]

Posted: 7/16/18 at 1:05pm

What happened to tonight's 7pm performance? It's listed on the schedule but then when you try to purchase tickets, it's nowhere to be found.

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 7/21/18 at 4:16pm

Oh man. Where do I even begin with this one? I think this may very well be one of the most poorly written plays I have ever seen in my entire life. The writing is so unbelievably bad and amateur, and the “plot” goes absolutely nowhere. The last fifteen minutes are the most frustrating minutes I have ever experienced in a theatre. I could go on and on about how much a hated this, but I think I’ve made myself clear. Avoid this one like the plague.

[scripps]

Posted: 7/21/18 at 5:13pm

YouDon'tClimbTrees said: "As much as I love Armie Hammer and am currently obsessed with "Call Me By Your Name," I disliked every moment of this play. I was hoping that seeing it would make me get over my crush on the man. Surprisingly, it almost did."

I hear you! My friend and I saw this via $99 discount preview seats in the third row for Armie and Armie only, and well ... he knew his lines. That love doesn't burn as brightly as it once did for either of us now. Your loss, Armie!