"... the move to a larger space – Circle in the Square has seven times as many seats as the Royal Court – has drained away intimacy and tension. Gone missing: much of what is necessary to make this 85-minute production as taut as Butterworth’s skilful text requires."
When Jez Butterworth’s The River premiered two years ago at the Royal Court’s Theatre Upstairs in London, it quickly became a hot ticket. In its new Broadway incarnation, directed again by Ian Rickson, the play is still highly popular, thanks to its star, Hugh Jackman, but the move to a larger space – Circle in the Square has seven times as many seats as the Royal Court – has drained away intimacy and tension. Gone missing: much of what is necessary to make this 85-minute production as taut as Butterworth’s skilful text requires.
The playwright is known in New York primarily for the rollicking 2011 staging of Jerusalem starring Mark Rylance. This time, however, we are back to Pinter-inflected Jez. The River exists in a claustrophobic world, devoid of external references except to the likes of Ted Hughes and Virginia Woolf.
Butterworth’s literariness can grow thick: The Man, who is Jackman’s character, launches into a speech about landing his first fish – angling is a primary subject in this essentially plotless piece – in which the rhythms out-Yeats Yeats. The Man was brought to a remote cabin, the drama’s setting, as a boy, and he returns regularly to catch sea trout. At first he plays host to The Woman – portrayed by the commanding Cush Jumbo – but as the story progresses she begins to change places with The Other Woman: the fetching Laura Donnelly, who also did the role in London.
Broadway audiences would gladly drink in the enormously appealing Jackman the song-and-dance man in perpetuity, just as movie-goers keep flocking to his Wolverine. To his credit, he wants to explore other worlds. But he has not found a way to convey effectively The Man’s frustration at not finding the all-enveloping love he professes to cherish. Watching him towards the end of The River, when the pain of reality sets in, I kept wishing I were glimpsing his face in close-up: the anguish would have been much clearer. The too-capacious venue is more ocean than river, and the emotional impact suffers.
They’ve asked us not to reveal the ending of “The River,” a play by Jez Butterworth (author of “Jerusalem”) starring Hugh Jackman as a man who likes to fish. But I’m not sure what difference knowing the ending would make, since it’s only slightly less enigmatic than the beginning or the middle of this play. The River Review: Hugh Jackman, Two Women, and a Sea Trout
"Aside from the charismatic star’s intense performance as a lovesick fisherman who is given to poetic laments over the fish (and the woman) who slipped away from him, just about everything else about Jez Butterworth’s strange chamber piece, “The River,” is a downer."
AP is negative Butterworth's 90-minute play, which made its debut in London in 2012, has rightly been compared to a silvery, shimmering fish, twisting and turning just out of reach. AP review of The River
"The River" is a whisper of a play, a lovely little look at the one that got away. Pity we spend so much time watching the gutting of the one that didn't.
"Sometimes the most intriguing mystery is revealed in a place where there’s no mystery at all. This is certainly the case with The River... Jez Butterworth’s 2012 play... is powered by a premise that’s provocative primarily because each of the three characters onstage refuses to mention it. And that would be the most newsworthy part of this play that needs no outside help if not for the smaller matter of casting its central role with one of the most unexpected of actors: Hugh Jackman."
"Despite the considerable charisma and commitment of its outsize star, Hugh Jackman, this new work is a sliver of a mood piece that never tightens its grip."
"While the 85-minute play does offer interesting observations on relationships, mystery and lyrical language, it has a dearth of action. Although there is a payoff at the end, it is hardly worth the wait."
"Whether manliness is next to goodliness is a different question, one the play itself — riveting, troubling, thought-provoking, unsatisfying — struggles to embody and never really answers."
"The three-character drama is emotionally exposed and intensely inconclusive -- a poetic, lusty puzzle that rivets one moment, exasperates another, and is destined to keep theatergoers arguing about its meaning all the way home, if not all season."
Lord Brantley seems to go mixed to positive? (he warned of getting too spoilery in the middle, so I stopped reading):
"This artfully staged production, set in a rural fishing cabin that is one man’s insular kingdom, is guaranteed to hold your attention. But you’re likely to leave it feeling hungry, and not just because it aims to mystify. Be grateful, then, that any pangs of emptiness are counterbalanced by the intriguing heft of Mr. Jackman’s strangely radiant opacity."
After seeing the remarkable Disgraced today, it sounds like the River doesn't hold a chance for the best play race. Sadly, the hallmark card that is Curious Incident will likely win.
Here's hoping for The Audience and Wolf Hall to split the Brit vote!
