“Conjures the passionate ambivalence of early adolescence with such being-there sharpness and poignancy that you’re not sure whether to cringe, cry or roar with happiness...Blazingly original and unsettlingly familiar...Cuts to the bone...A fearless cast, directed and choreographed with gloriously rough magic...The fact that the actresses playing these girls are adults...makes this latest work a memory play — and a reminder of how impossible it is to escape the way we were.”
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"Ferociously funny...Barron’s riotous, rattling, sensational new play...The kids are played by adults of varying ages...They sometimes break out of their time frame to share perspectives they will have years later. The effect of this doubleness is often hilarious—the actors’ dance skills also vary—but also poignant...Wondrous ensemble cast...Sharp direction...Has a pussy-power message, it is anything but fearless. It embraces fear, hugs it tight, and channels it into a queasy kind of triumph.”
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“If you were ever a 13-year-old girl, Clare Barron’s daring, raw ‘Dance Nation' will probably hit you hard. If you weren’t, the play might feel like strange, even somewhat disturbing terrain, but I’d urge you to venture in all the same...A brave, visceral, excitingly off-kilter barbaric yawp of a play. It’s angry and it’s sad. It’s brash and it’s funny. And it gets at something excruciatingly tender: the burden of modesty on young American women.”
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“Fearless and funny but frustrating...Avoids the typical pitfalls when adult actors play pre-teens...The work is bold, with ample profanity and flashes of nudity. But it trips up because it's too freewheeling for its own good...Subjects are raised and quickly abandoned. The tone shifts willy nilly...It's okay for a play to be messy, but Barron's work self-sabotages...Despite flaws, the show is uniformly terrifically acted...Most effective and eloquent when it's silent.”
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“The seriousness with which each battle is approached is one of the things that makes playwright Barron’s exhilarating ‘Dance Nation’ so good, especially in director/choreographer Evans' spot-on production. The point isn't to watch the play hoping they win. You just want to see them all get out of it alive...The young girls - and one boy...are all played by adults...thus we see the parallels between the issues they face as children and those that await them in adulthood.”
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"What seems at first like a cutesy affectation soon comes across as the only sensible way of presenting a play about young people that includes nudity and frank discussions of puberty and sexuality...The director's skill with the material is especially fortunate, since the script has it ragged moments and dead ends, as well bits of humor that don't quite land...The cast is totally on their playwright's wavelength."
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“Zuzu forgets her steps and freezes at a competition, setting up all kinds of trust and self-image conflicts that lack payoff. It's that kind of sloppiness that bothers me, along with the too-in-your-face sexuality...That said, Barron and Evans do conjure up some convincing moments...Barron has provocative things to say about how society turns many kids' formative years into nightmares...But teen bonding, peer shaming, and authority-figure bullying? You'll have a better time at 'Mean Girls.'"
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“The playwright interweaves her very funny play with topics that some might find out of bounds...Be prepared to be challenged...By presenting us with a wildly non-realistic dance team, Barron can slather on layers of fun, satire and incisive social commentary. The wildly nontraditional casting works well, with director Lee Sunday Evans perfectly illuminating the lives of the characters and providing the amusingly artless choreography as well. The cast is universally fine."
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