The Intelligent Homosexual's Guide to Capitalism and Socialism....

[foxy]

...With a Key to the Scriptures

 

I'm out of breath from just writing that title. I've got a ticket for this next week and curious to see if anyone has seen it? I'll give my 2 cents later.

[Steven_Draker]

Saw it in previews in Minneapolis in 2009 and loved it. I'm glad to see it finally hit Broadway.

 

http://www.companyofmen.org/showthread.php?68922-Tony-Kushner-s-World-Premiere-of-quot-The-Intelligent-Homosexual-quot&highlight=intelligent+homosexual

[foxy]

I thought this was a fascinating play and way too complex to summarize. Often all the actors are talking at once which reminded me of Robert Altman's films. You have to pick and choose who you want to listen to which makes for a complicated theater experience. It was how real families interact where everyone is talking but no one is really listening. No angels descend from the ceiling but for a play that runs over 3 hours I was never bored and it kept me thinking long after I saw it. Highly recommended.

[leeper]

Saw this yesterday, foxy was dead-on in his brief description. Definitely worth seeing, with two intermissions it's over 3 1/2 hours. Performances were excellent. Content complicated and thought-provoking. Lots of ideas and ideologies tossed around along with the names of obscure (at least to me) communists and labor activists.

[edjames]

...With a Key to the Scriptures

 

I'm out of breath from just writing that title. I've got a ticket for this next week and curious to see if anyone has seen it? I'll give my 2 cents later.

 

Saw it, well almost all of it, last night. I bolted after the second act. I was falling asleep. Wanted to like it but found it totally boring. It was the equivalent to August: Osage County on valium . As some have mentioned the ocassions where the actors have concurrent dialogue makes it almost impossible to figure out what they were saying. And the characters, Pill, Empty, V, Snooze???? The guy next to me fell asleep and the lack of enthusiastic applause at the end of both acts I saw leads me to believe the audience wasn't with it either. I wasn't the only one leaving the theater before the play's conclusion.

Perhaps it was a case that I just wasn't in the right frame of mind for this production, but alas, I wasn't. enjoy it more.

[uwsman2]

I saw it last night. It opened officially earlier in the week, and the reviews in the local dailies were mainly positive, with some dissent. Brantley in The Times liked it. Ultimately, so did I.

 

I thought the first act was way too long, and found myself drifting a few times. Lots of talky exposition. But once the characters are all established and the real "action" gets under way, I find that it really improves. The second act was a whirlwind, quite exciting. The third act slows down a bit, but doesn't lose its dramatic tension and had me really gripped through to the end.

 

The key is getting involved with these characters. I have to believe, as well, given the length of the play, that the quality of the performance may vary quite a bit from day to day depending on how "into it" the various actors get.

 

For me, the standout performer was Steven Pasquale, the gorgeous hunk who plays the youngest of the three children of elderly communist Gus Marcantonio. He has some of the most passionate lines and one can quickly develop empathy for the youngster whose father never took him seriously. Stephen Spinella as the gay son is fine, but I was not quite as impressed. His "hustler," played by Michael Esper, shows the most skin and is worth the view, but the character is perhaps a bit underwritten, if that seems possible in a Kushner play. Among the women, I especially liked Danielle Skraastad, who played Maeve, the pregnant partner of the lesbian daughter, who I thought just about stole every scene in which she had significant lines. Michael Cristofer as the old man struck me as inconsistent - at times a dominant figure, at others sort of fading into the background.

 

It is a dysfunctional family drama, talky at times, perhaps longer than it needed to be, but it poses lots of interesting questions about family relationships and is worth seeing during this limited run. Just be sure you are well-rested ahead of time...

[Steven_Draker]

Thank you, uwsman2, for this excellent review. It brought back some good memories.

 

http://img863.imageshack.us/img863/5318/aakushner1.jpg

 

http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/1102/aakushner2.jpg

 

http://img94.imageshack.us/img94/9171/aakushner3.jpg http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/1231/aakushner5.jpg