“None of the performances from the ensemble here seems to match up with any of the others in terms of style, temperament, scale or audibility...O’Toole looks perfect for the part. Yet her performance is strangely spasmodic...Nielsen isn’t a natural fit for a Williams play. But her extravagantly eccentric performance does manage to hint at the wounded center of a boisterous character...Though indubitably a lesser Williams work, 'Creve Coeur' does sparkle now and then."
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"Pendleton understands that great comedy is always grounded in real stakes and truthful performances. Executing knee-bends for dear life, Lichty is every bit the Williams Southern belle...Pendleton wisely presents 'Creve Coeur' in 105 uninterrupted minutes, revealing the play to be one brilliantly constructed and completely continuous scene. The comedy and drama build in equal measure, often feeding off each other. All of that springs from the truth at the heart of Williams's writing."
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"Very fine La Femme Theatre production of the lesser-known Tennessee Williams drama...Excellent work by Nielsen and O'Toole makes Bodey and Helena's conflict a comical highlight...Expanded to and hour and forty-five minutes (Pendleton has removed the intermission) the play does seem a bit slow and overstuffed. Still, this is a fine opportunity to see a well-mounted rarity by one of the great masters performed by an exceptional company."
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“Everything about this revival is busy...The action is nonstop...And yet, the play is, from the first line to the last, stuck in idle...Watching each of these actresses go her own stylistic way, one wonders exactly what sort of oversight the director, Austin Pendleton exercised over this production. If there is a workable play here this company is incapable of delivering it...A better, more nuanced approach would have allowed one to enjoy the script's occasional beauties.”
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"A handsome if uneven revival...The chief pleasures of this production are the always terrific Kristine Nielsen and Annette O’Toole...A very funny play...But there’s an undeniable undercurrent of tragedy...It’s a delicate tonal balance, and this production almost strikes it. The main problem is Lichty. She has the precise look—beautiful, thin, wispy, high-strung—that her character requires, but her speech is strained, almost manic, and, unfortunately, barely audible."
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"'Creve Coeur' did escape the scorn that met some of Williams’ other later works, leaving it ripe for a safe, sensitive revival, which is what director Austin Pendleton and his accomplished cast deliver here...There’s little to cackle at in this production, though the players gently stoke the piquant comedy Williams could always inject into the bleakest of circumstances."
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"I jumped at the chance to see this rarity by the great dramatist...Unquestionably, Williams' fortunes, both personal and professional, had peaked by the time this play appeared. But genius will out and in this instance shows him as remarkably perceptive...Williams lovers will delight in the contentiousness of the brittle and baiting conversations/confrontations. That he is able to make us laugh and feel deeply at the same time is a credit to his genius."
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“Even a cast led by…stalwarts…can do little to make this comedy splashed with pathos bring mild laughter to your lips or moisture to your eyes...Too little of the acting reveals the hearts, broken or otherwise, of these potentially interesting characters…[The] repetitive emphasis on the same basic conflicts comes to seem, over…an intermission-less hour and 45 minutes, increasingly artificial…Fails to convince that, other than because of its author's name, it's a treasure waiting to be found.”
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