WAITING FOR GODOT Reviews

[LimelightMike]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 12:35am

With WishingOnlyWounds2 championing the lovely ladies over at the Marquis this evening, I thought I would step aside and let it happen. That's the gentlemanly thing to do, as I see it. With that, I'll go on to spread the good word about a little show playing some eight blocks over at Studio 54. Tonight msrks the official opening night performance for the Roundabout Theatre Company's production of Samuel Beckett's WAITING FOR GODOT. Let us take a moment to welcome back to the boards Vladimir and Estragon and the ever-so-comedic stylings of Bill Irwin and Nathan Lane, John Glover and John Goodman. My best to all involved. Break legs, boys!

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 12:38am

It wasn't exactly my cup of tea (in terms of the production and the material; just putting that out there) but I do wish them the best of luck with the reviews.

If they are strong, maybe I will return to Studio 54 even though I said I wouldn't for this production. Maybe the production got better during the preview period...

Regardless, honestly, break a leg, cast and crew of GODOT.

[Kad]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 1:03am

Saw this last night and was very pleased with the production. Bill Irwin's performance in particular was outstanding.

[LimelightMike]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 5:13pm

Bumpin' ain't easy!

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 5:17pm

I absolutely loved this production. Each of the four lead actors' performances were so carefully etched and distinct that they kept the audience engaged thoroughly throughout what in any other production has the potential to be a very boring play.

I wish the cast and crew the best of luck tonight, and I encourage anyone who wants to experience fine acting by four pros who truly know how to embody their characters to take the trip to Studio 54 and enjoy.

[blaxx]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 6:56pm

Variety Raves

Aside from its title, there's no more perfect summation of "Waiting for Godot" than Estragon's complaint "Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it's awful." But there's no trace of that monotony in the perversely gripping non-drama and fine-grained emotional textures of this haunting revival. Samuel Beckett's 1953 play has been absent from Broadway for more than 50 years, and the current climate of pervasive anxiety makes the timing ideal for a comedy of existential despair -- even better when it comes wrapped in Anthony Page's transcendent production, showcasing four distinctive actors at the top of their game.

http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117940162.html?categoryid=33&cs=1

[BustopherPhantom]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:03pm

The Associated Press is a Rave:

"Anthony Page directed Irwin in the clear-headed 2005 revival of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" Page's work here is equally crisp.

There is one more character in "Godot," a boy, alternately played at Studio 54by Cameron Clifford and Matthew Schechter. He appears at the ends of the play's first and second acts. This young messenger apparently has seen Godot, a fact that fills Vladimir with wonder and dread.

Yet even then, he and Estragon can't leave their posts. Despite proclaiming, "let's go," the men dither about giving up the wait. You'll find their indecision most haunting."

http://www.victoriaadvocate.com/news/2009/apr/30/bc-us-theater-review-waiting-for-godothfr/?entertainment

[MiracleElixir]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:11pm

And he said, let there be raves. Sign of things to come, I assure you.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:29pm

The Bergen Record is Very Positive if not a Rave:

"...rwin?s restraint and Lane?s explosiveness refine and pinpoint the characters, giving them full-bodied, often humorous existence without diminishing a sense of their plight.

Also in the cast are John Goodman and John Glover, playing the two passing strangers who disrupt the waiting of Vladimir and Estragon.
As the imperious, apparently wealthy Pozzo, Goodman offers an outsized figure of appalling pomposity, while Glover is properly inscrutable as Pozzo?s slave, Lucky.

Anybody who knows the play has his or her own ideas about how ?Waiting for Godot? should be performed, and this somewhat rambunctious production, directed by Anthony Page, probably won?t please everyone.

But Beckett?s great work, ranging through most human emotions, and with lines and scenes open to multiple interpretations, allows for many choices. The ones in this presentation work very well for me."

http://www.northjersey.com/entertainment/stage/WAITING0430.html

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:29pm

Double post. Updated On: 4/30/09 at 07:29 PM

[BustopherPhantom]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:40pm

Backstage is a Rave:

"...the real revelation here is John Goodman as the self-important Pozzo. Resembling a low-rent Sydney Greenstreet, Goodman dominates his scenes as he imposes his gigantic ego on the clueless tramps. When he returns as blind as a bat and falls in a heap in the second act, he resembles an enormous paralyzed bullfrog. He's unable to move but still demands to be the center of attention. As the enigmatic Lucky, John Glover endows every movement and glance with pages of subtext. At one moment he is a feral animal, snarling and biting at strangers, the next an unstoppable orator spilling over with polysyllabic nonsense when Pozzo commands him to "think." Even the little boy, played by Cameron Clifford at the performance attended (he alternates with Matthew Schechter), has a rich inner life.

Santo Loquasto creates a bleak yet detailed landscape, poetically lit by Peter Kaczorowski, for this screamingly funny and howlingly sad Godot."

http://www.backstage.com/bso/reviews-ny-theatre-broadway/waiting-for-godot-1003968310.story

[Kad]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:41pm

That review from Variety is fantastic! Good for them!

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:43pm

I'm sorry, I think we all know I didn' t like this production very much at all but I have to say, I'm happy for them getting these reviews, but REALLY, Backstage?

John Goodman is a "REVELATION"?! The other three men and even the kid were leagues better than him. A revelation? I mean, really?

[BustopherPhantom]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:47pm

He could have gotten better. :)

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:49pm

I thought Goodman was wonderful. Certainly not a revelation, but his performance was perfect.

[Kad]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:50pm

I was EXTREMELY impressed with John Goodman. I didn't think he was the best, but he was extremely impressive.

This IS his Broadway debut, and he does show off a side of his acting ability that most people have not seen.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:51pm

Ha, bustopher there's a difference between getting better from being terrible and being a revelation. If Goodman was able to turn around a truly mediocre at best performance to one worthy of being called a revelation in .. what? ..three weeks, I, in the words of Ben Brantley, will eat my hat.


Maybe I will make another venture to Studio 54 after all...but then again, maybe I won't...
Updated On: 4/30/09 at 07:51 PM

[johng428]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:55pm

I seem to remember John Goodman being the father in Big River. So this is not his Broadway debut.

[BustopherPhantom]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 7:59pm

USA Today gives the show 3 1/2 Stars out of 4:

"Under Anthony Page's brisk but sensitive direction, Lane and Irwin mine the humor and pathos in this simple but richly symbolic dilemma. Watching Irwin's thoughtful, restless Didi and the sad clown that is Lane's needy Gogo clash with and cling to each other is like watching two boys in a sandbox, learning primal struggles that will never stop informing their lives. When a red-faced Lane recoils from Irwin, telling him, "Don't touch me," then in the next breath pleads, "Stay with me," the terse lines speak volumes about the need for and impossibility of human connection.

Goodman and John Glover lend excellent support as Pozzo and Lucky, a blowhard and his miserable but oddly passive slave. Both men are, like Didi and Gogo ? like all of us ? prisoners of themselves. Santo Loquasto's scenic design and Jane Greenwood's costumes enhance the dim, ambiguous atmosphere: gray suits, gray rocks, a gray sky and a thin, sad tree that sprouts a few leaves in the second act.

We'll never know what the growth means ? is it a false promise, an allusion, a glimmer of hope? ? but Page and company ensure that we are profoundly entertained, and moved, as we wonder."

http://www.usatoday.com/life/theater/reviews/2009-04-30-godot-9to5_N.htm

[Kad]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 8:04pm

You're absolutely right.


And rOcKs.... you described the show as "painful", said you wasted your money, wanted to leave at intermission, and generously gave it one out of four stars. I'm seriously wondering if you were in an entirely different theatre than myself and these critics.

Goodman turned in a wonderful performance, and I doubt it got that way over the course of the preview process.

Updated On: 4/30/09 at 08:04 PM

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 8:06pm

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times. GODOT is certainly a show that requires its fans to have an acquired taste. And I saw the first preview, admittedly not the best performance to judge for a show like this.

I was just being honest with my review...I wasn't going to give it a rave just because I thought everyone else would. And I know I'm not the only person who didn't like it. It's just a matter of personal taste when it comes to shows like GODOT.
Updated On: 4/30/09 at 08:06 PM

[Kad]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 8:10pm

At the performance Tuesday, several people walked out or left at intermission.

Being firmly in the "fan" camp of Beckett and GODOT, I thought the production and all involved were stellar.

[BustopherPhantom]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 8:18pm

The Hollywood Reporter is a Rave:

"People will probably debate the meaning of Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot" until the end of time, but the reaction of one audience member at the current Broadway revival might say it all. At one point late in the first act, he rose from his seat and stormed up the aisle, and was then heard banging on one of the rear doors of the theater while crying, "Let me out of here!"

Somewhere, the playwright must be smiling.

The reactions of other theatergoers will likely be much more favorable, since this Broadway revival of the classic work, the first since its premiere, is one of the most entertaining and powerful renditions of the play that this critic has ever seen."

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/film-reviews/theater-review-waiting-for-godot-1003968331.story

[Sauja]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 9:37pm

I'm so thrilled with these reviews. Between this, The Seagull, Joe Turner, and (off-Broadway) Our Town, it has been, in my estimation, one of the best seasons in recent memory for extraordinary productions of classic plays. I hope this show finds the audience it so richly deserves.

Fingers crossed that the money review turns up aces!

[CyCoSpAz2]

Posted: 4/30/09 at 9:40pm

Great reviews for such a wonderful production!