Saints Go Marching OnExactly three years ago this week,
I reviewed Kate Fodor's fear-of-God-inducing
100 Saints You Should Know during its initial Off-Broadway run at
Playwrights Horizons.
For those New Yorkers who didn't have an opportunity to see that incarnation, you'll now have a chance to see another production.
Rebecca Hengstenberg is directing Pat Clune, Pat Dwyer, Catherine Goodman, Eddie Vona and Ellen Warner in a strictly limited engagement for this provocative play at
The Shell Theater (300 West 43rd Street 4th floor) this September 22-25 at 8:00 p.m. and September 26 at 2:00 p.m.
100 Saints You Should Know is described by
SmartTix as follows:
Theresa is estranged from her family and working as a cleaning woman when she is surprised by the desire to learn how to pray. Matthew, the priest whose rectory she cleans, is stunned and heartbroken by the realization that he no longer knows how to talk to God. When Matthew disappears one day, Theresa feels compelled to track him down, and her search changes both of their lives.
While I regret not being available to be there for any of next weekend's performances -- especially given how moved I was three years ago by Fodor's compelling story of life and death as faith intersects with doubt -- I certainly wish I'd be able to see it anew.
If you have a chance to see the production, please let me know what you think. For tickets, please click
here.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
In keeping with the new that unfairly discriminate against bloggers, who are now required by law to disclose when they have received anything of value they might write about, please note that I have received nothing of value in exchange for this post. Labels: 100 Saints You Should Know, Catherine Goodman, Eddia Vona, Ellen Warner, Kate Fodor, Off-Broadway, Pat Clune, Pat Dwyer, Play, Rebecca Hengstenberg
100 Saints: Were Critics Singing Its Praises?Two evenings ago, budding playwright
Kate Fodor's new play
100 Saints You Should Know opened. The reviews are mixed on the material, but generally positive on performances.
Calling it "a play you should know,"
Newsday's
Linda Winer recommends the work: "Fodor invents rich characters who speak in their own peculiar rhythms and make observations that defy our expectations for this perilous subject matter....
Ethan McSweeny has directed an exquisite cast to find the humor, absurdity and simple elegance of the search....The luminous
Lois Smith continues her recent surge of priceless portrayals of seemingly ordinary women in such plays as
The Trip to Bountiful....Any cliche of the impossibly precocious daughter is turned into something exhilarating, scary and new by the terrific young actress
Zoe Kazan....
Jeremy Shamos has a quiet, touching credibility as the priest whose conflicts go beyond the generality of headlines into particular heartbreak."
Observing that the show's characters "earn the attention they crave,"
Variety's
Marilyn Stasio also offers praise: "Helmer Ethan McSweeny's sensitive reading of the material and an extremely classy cast make all the difference in a production of this episodic and none-too-original drama about the difficulties of grasping and holding onto one's beliefs in a modern world....Structurally, Fodor has written an articulate, if dramatically circular play, with the overlong and repetitive setup scenes in the first act methodically paying off in the second."
Taking note of "unresolved quality throughout,"
Ben Brantley of
The New York Times is mostly kind: "This tale of everyday people in search of faith, directed by Ethan McSweeny and featuring the estimable Lois Smith, is thoughtful, well spoken, humbly aware of its limitations and respectful of its characters. It is, in other words, the kind of play you could take home to mother. Just don’t expect it to provide you with a transporting night of passion....But the story approaches these topical matters with a calm, open mind and a tidy, symmetrical structure that balances and parallels different points of view....Ms. Kazan enjoyably nails the hostile neediness of an adolescent girl who hates her mother as much as she loves her. And Ms. Smith...turns Colleen’s first scene into a mini master class in acting."
Labeling it "sensitive and engaging yet, in the end, uneven,"
Joe Dziemianowicz of New York's
Daily News offers a mixed review: "The dialogue sometimes sounds more like a setup for punch lines than honest-to-God conversation....(The second act) tolls with such honesty and depth that one imagines
Francis de Sales, the patron saint of authors, watching Fodor's back when she wrote it....The always excellent Lois Smith makes the most of Colleen....Zoe Kazan, memorable last year in
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is uninhibited and brash and makes the wild-child Abby both believable and sympathetic."
Noting how
100 Saints You Should Know "has enough issues for a trio of
Lifetime movies,"
New York Post's
Frank Scheck offers a two-and-a-half star review: "Though the playwright's compassion is evident -- as is her ability to interweave their plights in emotionally resonant and sometimes humorous ways --
100 Saints has a patented feel that recalls the many similarly sensitive off-Broadway dramas that preceded it....To her credit, Fodor doesn't provide any pat solutions to her characters' crises....It's hardly a surprise that Smith is wonderful, but there is also fine work by Moloney...Shamos....and the two younger performers.
As you'll recall from last week,
I recommended the production with ***1/2 stars. Performances of
100 Saints You Should Know run through September 30.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.Related Stories:100 Saints: One Opening Night (September 18, 2007)
100 Saints You Should Know (The SOB Review) (September 14, 2007)
Labels: 100 Saints You Should Know, Critics' Capsule, Jeremy Shamos, Kate Fodor, Lois Smith, Off-Broadway, Play, Zoe Kazan
100 Saints: One Opening NightThis evening marks the opening night for
Kate Fodor's "world premiere" Off-Broadway engagement of
100 Saints You Should Know at
Playwrights Horizons, which offers this synopsis:
Theresa cleans the rectory of the local parish to support her unruly teenage daughter. When its priest leaves the church under uncertain circumstances and returns home to his protective mother, Theresa finds herself compelled to pursue him. One eventful night joins them all, forcing a reckoning with the broken memories and shaken faith that divides them — and the discovery of a shared, tenuous common ground.
Last week, I provided
my positive review. Other bloggers have weighed in, too -- some good (like
Rocco at What's Good/What Blows) and some not so good (like
George Hunka of Superfluities who created quite the stir by reviewing the show without staying beyond the first act -- hey, at least he's honest!).
Tomorrow, I'll let you know whether critics think this is a show worth knowing.
(Despite its late September opening, the show is currently scheduled to close on the 30th.)
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.
Related Stories:
100 Saints You Should Know (The SOB Review) (September 14, 2007)
Labels: 100 Saints You Should Know, Blogs, Kate Fodor, Off-Broadway, Opening Night, Play, Superfluities, What's Good/What Blows in New York Theatre
Saints Go Marching On
