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Post by Rory on Mar 11, 2022 0:05:38 GMT
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6,347 posts
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Post by Jon on Mar 11, 2022 0:07:45 GMT
David Harbour while probably best known for Stranger Things has done plenty of theatre, he was in The Invention of Love and The Coast of Utopia on Broadway.
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Post by couldileaveyou on Mar 11, 2022 0:12:40 GMT
Mmm I like him but I have a very low opinion of Rebeck as a playwright.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 11, 2022 0:15:27 GMT
Mmm I like him but I have a very low opinion of Rebeck as a playwright. Always find it remarkable that her plays get produced - and sometimes on major stages with no previous production. Baffles my mind. For ever good play she's written, she's written a dozen turds.
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Post by princeton on Mar 11, 2022 0:32:13 GMT
It's not his London stage debut as he played Nick in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf at the Apollo in 2006 alongside Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin in a production which transferred from Broadway.
And agree it's baffling how often Rebeck's plays get produced as the misses far outnumber the hits.
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Post by Marwood on Mar 11, 2022 8:58:21 GMT
I saw him in Glengarry Glen Ross on Broadway with Al Pacino and Bobby Cannavale ten years ago, playing the role that Kevin Spacey did in the movie. Good luck to him but I doubt I will bother seeing this unless there are some serious deals going on price wise when it opens.
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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 11, 2022 9:16:03 GMT
It's not his London stage debut as he played Nick in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf at the Apollo in 2006 alongside Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin in a production which transferred from Broadway. And agree it's baffling how often Rebeck's plays get produced as the misses far outnumber the hits. I thought I’d seen him on stage in London !
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Post by shadypines on Mar 17, 2022 8:32:38 GMT
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Post by Rory on Mar 17, 2022 11:18:23 GMT
I can't find how to edit the thread title to 'Mad House'.
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Post by dlevi on Mar 17, 2022 11:54:15 GMT
Theresa Rebeck's career totally baffles me. She's a slick writer to be sure, but have any of the plays been really good? Though I guess she does write juicy parts for actors and not all playwrights do that.
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Mar 17, 2022 11:56:51 GMT
I can't find how to edit the thread title to 'Mad House'. Done
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Post by Rory on Mar 17, 2022 12:24:03 GMT
Thanks.
I love a family saga but did I read somewhere this is a two-hander?
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Post by princeton on Mar 17, 2022 12:55:02 GMT
This from a mailing I got today: "In rural Pennsylvania, Michael has returned to his childhood home to look after his dying father. His siblings Ned and Pam soon arrive, determined to work out how much money Dad actually has left and how they're getting their hands on it". So definitely three actors and possibly a fourth (I can imagine that the dying father is never seen).
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Post by mkb on Mar 17, 2022 13:46:41 GMT
£100 for most of the Stalls. When that halves, I might be interested.
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Post by Rory on Mar 17, 2022 16:20:53 GMT
Was there pre Sale to ATG cardholders? And if not, why not?!
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Post by david on Mar 17, 2022 17:59:35 GMT
Was there pre Sale to ATG cardholders? And if not, why not?! There was a 1hr presale for ATG TC holders this am.
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Post by Rory on Mar 17, 2022 19:25:47 GMT
Thanks david. One whole hour with bugger all notice whatsoever!
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Post by jampot on Mar 17, 2022 19:30:18 GMT
Thanks david. One whole hour with bugger all notice whatsoever! Card holder and received nothing..
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Post by Rory on Mar 17, 2022 21:10:47 GMT
Thanks david. One whole hour with bugger all notice whatsoever! Card holder and received nothing.. Same here. What's the point if you hear nothing?
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Post by Mark on Jun 7, 2022 9:44:53 GMT
Really good deal on TodayTix, just picked up row D circle for £25 for the first Saturday matinee next weekend.
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Post by mkb on Jun 7, 2022 10:59:46 GMT
Thanks for the heads-up. Never used TodayTix before, but discovered they have a very strange policy. In addition to the usual ban on leaving a single seat, they won't let you book two single seats: all seats have to be adjacent. As confirmed to me by their Chat person, the only workaround is to raise a separate order for each single seat. Bizarre.
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Post by Mark on Jun 7, 2022 11:45:07 GMT
Thanks for the heads-up. Never used TodayTix before, but discovered they have a very strange policy. In addition to the usual ban on leaving a single seat, they won't let you book two single seats: all seats have to be adjacent. As confirmed to me by their Chat person, the only workaround is to raise a separate order for each single seat. Bizarre. Oh that is strange. I know just recently I've had to book 3 singles for Billy Elliot in Leicester and then a single and a pair for Crazy for You just due to availability. Odd that you can't book like this via Todaytix.
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Post by Mark on Jun 18, 2022 18:25:59 GMT
First thoughts I guess!
Saw the matinee today and really enjoyed it. The play is solid, similar premise to Fever Syndrome but much better executed here. It’s no spoiler to really say it’s about a dysfunctional family all after their dying fathers inheritance.
Cast is great. David Harbour leads and I thought he was excellent throughout. Bill Pullman is clearly having a lot of fun playing the bugger of a father. Special mention to Akiya Henry who is incredibly touching and really holds the piece together. I certainly think they will be recognised come award season.
Highly recommend. I was row D circle and had a great view. You should be fine anywhere in the stalls too as nothing takes place up a height.
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Post by david on Jun 18, 2022 19:48:38 GMT
First thoughts I guess! Saw the matinee today and really enjoyed it. The play is solid, similar premise to Fever Syndrome but much better executed here. It’s no spoiler to really say it’s about a dysfunctional family all after their dying fathers inheritance. Cast is great. David Harbour leads and I thought he was excellent throughout. Bill Pullman is clearly having a lot of fun playing the bugger of a father. Special mention to Akiya Henry who is incredibly touching and really holds the piece together. I certainly think they will be recognised come award season. Highly recommend. I was row D circle and had a great view. You should be fine anywhere in the stalls too as nothing takes place up a height. Thanks for the info about the seating Mark. I've booked to see the show next Thursday afternoon (if I am able to get down to London with the train strikes) and got one of the £35 row D centre circle seats for £35 myself. I was going to try and move to Stalls Row B which had the same price but based on your info, I'll stick with my original seat I think.
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Post by Mark on Jun 18, 2022 20:23:05 GMT
First thoughts I guess! Saw the matinee today and really enjoyed it. The play is solid, similar premise to Fever Syndrome but much better executed here. It’s no spoiler to really say it’s about a dysfunctional family all after their dying fathers inheritance. Cast is great. David Harbour leads and I thought he was excellent throughout. Bill Pullman is clearly having a lot of fun playing the bugger of a father. Special mention to Akiya Henry who is incredibly touching and really holds the piece together. I certainly think they will be recognised come award season. Highly recommend. I was row D circle and had a great view. You should be fine anywhere in the stalls too as nothing takes place up a height. Thanks for the info about the seating Mark. I've booked to see the show next Thursday afternoon (if I am able to get down to London with the train strikes) and got one of the £35 row D centre circle seats for £35 myself. I was going to try and move to Stalls Row B which had the same price but based on your info, I'll stick with my original seat I think. Just brace yourself for the very limited legroom! Great view though for sure, look forward to your thoughts.
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Post by dm913 on Jun 18, 2022 22:44:21 GMT
What's the running time for this?
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Post by Mark on Jun 18, 2022 22:55:25 GMT
What's the running time for this? Approx 2 hrs 30
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Post by Steve on Jun 18, 2022 23:27:18 GMT
I loved this tonight! It's not a perfect play, but it's a great entertainment. It's first half is hilarious, much funnier than "The Unfriend," for example, or "Cock" (which preceded this play in this venue), in my opinion, then the second half dives into the deep seriousness of a Tracy Letts dysfunctional family play, and almost succeeds in being a great play, but tries too hard to hit too many targets too late to actually be one. David Harbour is a brilliant anchor for this atonality, as he roots the raucous comedy of the first half in thoughtful and believable melancholy, then he roots the family tragedy of the second half in a loose and alive comic unpredictability. He is the key to this play maintaining depth and never becoming exhausting. Tonight the house was full, and I was glad that, like with "Prima Facie," I booked Side Stalls E seats ahead of time, paying the big bucks, but avoiding the really big bucks lol. This house is small, and the show is entertaining, and there are two great actors at the centre of this doing great work, and one of them is in "Stranger Things," which just propelled Kate Bush to number one in the charts. Simply put, I wouldn't be complacent about tickets to this show, and would take advantage of the fact that there are still tons of tickets right now, at every price point, to book ahead, rather than wait till the show is a month from closing and realise tickets are being priced upwards. Some spoilers follow. . . My only experience of Theresa Rebeck is seeing Roger Allam in Hampstead Theatre's "Seminar." In that play, Allam played the meanest writing teacher in the world in the first half, then got sentimental in the second half. The mean comedy of the first half induced belly laughs (Roger Allam is very funny when he's mean), and then the second half almost succeeded at turning the whole thing dramatic. This play was very similar, but magnified. I mean, Bill Pullman's Daniel, unbelievably, is even meaner and even funnier here than Roger Allam was in "Seminar," and Allam made his pupils cry with his savagery! In his mistreatment of his son, Pullman combines the gleeful mania of a Jack Nicholson in "The Shining" with the gruff glinting gritted macho of Robert Shaw's Quint in Jaws lol, but of course, he's not as scary, and more comic-tragic, as he's got emphysema, can barely breathe, and deteriorating and dying, he's being cared for by the child he likes the least (as he so cruelly insists on saying), David Harbour's Michael. Whereas Pullman roots his comedy in performative outrageousness, Harbour roots his in boiling frustration, an overwhelmed and depressed version of Basil Fawlty, with added empathy and human decency. Harbour is immensely likeable, and the principal connection with a recognisable reality in the off-the-wall first half. My favourite comic moments came when Harbour's Michael finally loses the plot and sings "Danny Boy" to Daniel, a more appropriate and yet a more inappropriate song would have been impossible to imagine! Funniest thing I've seen in ages! But all this comedy would be wearing if it weren't for two things: a touching human connection for Michael with the hospice carer, Lillian, a grounded and empathic Aliya Henry, and an antagonistic relationship with his malevolent menace of a sister, Pam, played with callous and manipulative contempt by Sinead Matthews. Both Henry and Matthews are superb in their respective roles, engendering love and hate respectively, from me, for each of their characters. Matthews once played the most alive and tender sidekick and friend for Sian Brooke in Mike Leigh's "Ecstasy" at Hampstead Theatre, winning my undying affection, but she lost it for good with this Tracy Letts classic of a monster lol! Anyhow, this play has some seriously great scenes, but too many themes: what is it to be crazy, what is it to be alive, sibling rivalry, parental favouritism, the corrupting power of money, etc, etc, and all this tagged onto some fantastic comic set pieces. The whole thing is too disjointed and unrealised ambition to be truly great, and yet it is truly terrific entertainment! 4 stars from me.
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Post by ncbears on Jun 19, 2022 14:05:50 GMT
Not seeing a lot of availability for lesser ticket prices this weekend when we will be in London. Perhaps a nice visit to box office is in order.
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Post by Rory on Jun 20, 2022 13:43:32 GMT
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