REVIEWS: Two Broadway shows to see before they close
Photo: Cult of Love stars, from left, Rebecca Henderson and Roberta Colindrez. Photo courtesy of Joan Marcus / Provided by Polk & Co. with permission.
NEW YORK — It’s already been written about, but it begs repeating. This Broadway season seems to be the year of the comedy. Eureka Day is offering up some politically prescient laughs at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, courtesy of the Manhattan Theatre Club, and Oh, Mary! still sells out at the Lyceum Theatre after first winning over audiences downtown. Both shows are hearty laugh-fests, and here’s a third one to consider: Cult of Love by Leslye Headland at the Helen Hayes Theatre, courtesy of Second Stage Theatre. Performances for the ensemble dramedy continue through Sunday, Feb. 2.
Headland’s intermissionless piece follows a family of adult siblings who head home to their parents’ Connecticut house for the holidays. Zachary Quinto, Rebecca Henderson, Christopher Sears and Shailene Woodley play the siblings, all of them willing to sing Christmas carols with Mom and Dad (Mare Winningham and David Rasche), but also increasingly realizing that they have grown apart. Fights ensue about religion, sexuality, divorce, work and drug addiction. Molly Bernard, Roberta Colindrez, Barbie Ferreira and Christopher Lowell play the partners and in-laws who have been brought into this tense family dynamic.
There’s a lot of hurt within this 100-minute narrative, especially when Woodley’s character offends and disappoints Henderson’s character, but somehow they strive to make it through the holiday, almost like a chore that needs to be accomplished. The siblings clearly have a fealty to their parents — Mom is still living in a fantasy world when her children were still children, and Dad is starting to lose his memory — but they also have competing interests, differing world views and discomfiting words to say to the people they supposedly love the most.
This is smart, smart comedy, directed with skill by Trip Cullman, that is never too far from a dramatic scene that knocks the audience back in its seats. The building up and tearing down of this family makes for heartbreaking entertainment because each of the actors, especially Henderson and Winningham, fully buy into the import of how this Christmas holiday will ultimately define the future of this American family.
Another show that is filling seats and attracting theatergoers is far from the laughs of big comedies on Broadway. Romeo + Juliet, starring Kit Connor and Rachel Zegler, continues at Circle in the Square through Sunday, Feb. 16. Sam Gold, the director, knows a thing or two about bringing the Bard to Broadway. His previous William Shakespeare credits include Macbeth with Daniel Craig and King Lear with Glenda Jackson.
Gold’s R+J leans into the youth mentality that is necessary to make the tragic romance work on stage. He has cast the revival with excellent performers, with Connor and Zegler more than up for the challenge of the difficult material. They are star-crossed lovers stuck in an eternal battle between opposing families, and the audience completely believes their love-can-find-a-way approach to romance.
Solid supporting work comes from Tommy Dorfman as the Nurse and Tybalt, Gabby Beans as Mercutio and the Friar, and Taheen Modak as Benvolio, among others. They bring an exciting exuberance to the staging, fully taking over every inch of the circle-in-the-round Circle in the Square. They jump, dance, sing, rock out, hang from bars, run back and forth, and engage the audience in countless ways. One could almost call this R+J an immersive production; that’s how much the audience feels like they are a Montague or Capulet at the ultimately tragic proceedings.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Click here for more information on Cult of Love, which continues through Sunday, Feb. 2, at the Helen Hayes Theatre. Click here for more information on Romeo + Juliet, which continues through Sunday, Feb. 16, at Circle in the Square.
