"A heartbreaker for anyone human...The play, under Kauffman’s ideally detailed direction, is not out to answer any questions. In that sense 'Mary Jane,' with its ordinary name, is a character study, an Everywoman story..But 'Mary Jane' is nevertheless a very big drama, even if its conflicts are almost never between people. They are instead between Mary Jane and her unspoken ideas about life—that is, God. To me, this makes 'Mary Jane' the most profound and harrowing of Herzog’s many fine plays."
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"There are no villains here, only people doing their best under sometimes crushing circumstances. All are rendered in lovely detail by Herzog and the five women of the cast, directed by Anne Kauffman with characteristic attention to the importance of offhand nuance...Herzog shows the strain of Mary Jane’s situation—layered with beautiful reserve by Coon—but she also succeeds in dramatizing kindness, attentiveness, honesty, connection."
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"Though it’s meticulously crafted, 'Mary Jane' feels like such a recognizable slice-of-life that it’s difficult to get a sense of the urgent physical need at the heart of the piece, the thing that demands that it be a work of theater...It shows us a very hard life, and that’s pretty much all it does...What keeps 'Mary Jane' afloat is its ensemble...It’s a portrait of someone who deserves recognition, but whose story has yet to take full advantage of the power of its art form to make us see."
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"Herzog’s beautiful new play...Coon is an appealing performer, but at first I was put off by her characterization—sometimes it felt as though she was working on one level, until I realized that Mary Jane hardly ever deviates from her optimism because she’s a preternaturally optimistic person...I was much more taken by Colón-Zayas and Wehle...'Mary Jane' is Herzog’s most satisfying work to date because it has verisimilitude that many contemporary realistic plays don’t."
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"Ms. Coon’s new supporting cast is perfect, as is Ms. Kauffman’s discreetly compelling staging. As for the play, it is, here as in New Haven, overwhelming, a wrenching tale of everyday heroism that is all the more touching for its total lack of sentimentality. I’ve never seen a more honest portrayal of the day-to-day demands of caregiving, or a more moving tribute to a mother’s love. It might just be Ms. Herzog’s best play to date."
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"Coon's work in the title role of Amy Herzog’s slow burner of a play, 'Mary Jane'...coils, quietly and almost imperceptibly, to a climax that, like the death of a loved one, strips us to the core, no matter how well-prepared we think we are...Mary Jane threatens to be campaigning for sainthood, but every time she approaches a threshold, playwright and director conspire brilliantly to remind us how forcefully human she is."
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"One of the triumphs of this clear-eyed, compassionate and engaging play at New York Theatre Workshop through mid-October is that it upends expectations even if it doesn’t ever take drastic turns. Fine writing and feel-real dialogue each have ways of exerting an insistent tug. The same holds for strong acting...It’s a heavy story, but still infused with humor. Director Anne Kauffman’s deliberately paced production brings out the lightness and gravity."
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"Amy Herzog’s devastating new work...is must-see theater for anyone with a heart...Mary Jane is a person of many parts–and Coon respects and relates to them all...The beauty of the character and the wonder of Coon’s performance is that, through it all, Mary Jane succeeds in maintaining her upbeat nature, her life-affirming optimism, her wonderful sense of humor. Believe it or not, this play is full of laughs. They just happen to be on the morbid side."
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