The End of Longing @ MCC

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The End of Longing @ MCC

Posted: 5/18/17 at 10:31pm

Oh, how I longed for it to end, but alas, The End of Longing took its sweet time coming to a conclusion I had long since giving up caring about, if I even did in the first place.

Matthew Perry can be a strong actor/comedian when given the right material. One need only look at his recent work in The Good Fight going up against the great Carrie Preston to witness his skills. But watch his play tonight I thought of that line from All About Eve when Lloyd yells at Margo: I shall never understand the weird process by which a body with a voice suddenly fancies itself as a mind.

The actors try. Really they do. But there's nothing to make out of this. Jennifer Morrison is stunningly beautiful and I laugh-groaned a couple of times, but I think those years of reciting CBS multi-cam lines took its toll on Perry (more his writing than his acting). I know he has been in and out of rehab over the years and the play deals with addictions, so perhaps this was a personal thing for him and he was just too close to the material to make it work. It was better when it was serious, so maybe he should have approached it in a more dramatic way than in the sitcomy way it was presented.

Marie: Don't be in such a hurry about that pretty little chippy in Frisco. Tony: Eh, she's a no chip!

The End of Longing @ MCC

Posted: 5/18/17 at 10:56pm

It started off amusingly, but soon drifted into triteness and bathos. Still, it was far more tolerable than the wretched pieces we've encountered far too often on this stage, most notably, the previous MCC production, Yen.

The End of Longing @ MCC

Posted: 5/21/17 at 12:46am

great review Whizzer, you captured a great deal of my thoughts on this show. I liked the idea of the two main characters (Stephanie/Jack) as damaged people trying to connect, but the writing just wasn't there to flesh it out. And I pretty much thought the second storyline with the other two characters was distracting because, especially for Quincy Dunn-Baker, very little motivation was given for the their feelings/actions.

I will however say that I loved the set design, which was at times, slightly more compelling than the dialogue on stage.

The End of Longing @ MCC

Posted: 5/31/17 at 11:07am

I saw this last night. I found it pretty rocky at first, but it grew on me. It's true, the writing is messy, but after the first few stumbling scenes, I began to enjoy the sort of quirky wit of the dialogue, and the emotional honesty of the story. I do think, however, that Perry's dialogue sounds better spoken by himself than by other actors. Most of the time I found the jokes more amusing than outright funny, but I think that was sort of as it was supposed to be. It wasn't the broad, presentation style of humor you'd see in slapstick comedies. Though I did full-on laugh several times.

Ultimately, I don't think this was attempting to be a groundbreaking, innovative piece of theatre, but I feel like Perry bared his soul in a way that I can't help but respect. The characters felt real and honest. I believed their struggles, and I believed their relationship, so I was able to become absorbed in the story. I didn't look at my watch even once, which is actually a pretty big deal for me. I almost always check my watch a few times, even during shows I really like.

Interestingly, Matthew Perry chose to entirely omit "Friends" from his Playbill bio. Isn't that hilarious? I've never noticed another actor doing something like that. I suppose he wants to distance himself from it after being so closely associated with it all these years.

The End of Longing @ MCC

Posted: 5/31/17 at 11:17am

I saw it on Saturday. I did like it, but it is really not that memorable and it is very predictable. Everyone was just fine. No one really that special. Matthew was beautiful with his monologue at the end and Jennifer did a great job with the emotional scenes, but overall yeah. Everyone did a fine job. I really liked the scenic design and sitting in the mezz, the glass bottles go to the ceiling, which was cool.

At the stage door, it was only Matthew and Jennifer. Jennifer was very appreciative of her fans while as expected Matthew was stand-offish and cold, but he did thank people which was nice.

Updated On: 5/31/17 at 11:17 AM

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