"The toxic love that develops between Julie (Elise Kibler) and the black servant John is strangled almost from its inception by societal sins past. That perspective is heightened by the performance of Kibler, who looks defenselessly young and unformed...Julie’s passivity shifts the emphasis from the play’s title character to John and his mother, Christine. They are both excellent...The sense of a world in which everyone is terminally rootless comes across with haunting acuteness."
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"South African playwright Yaël Farber cleverly uses the template of Strindberg’s 1888 play 'Miss Julie' to explore clashes of class, gender, race and ownership in her homeland...Ali's raw, in-the-round staging...is meant to jar. It leaves nothing to the imagination...Kibler isn't as strong as her costars—her accent is as fickle as her character's emotions—but Julie’s fate is still haunting, as is Farber's insight into what continues to ail their country."
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"Kibler and Udom’s piercing performances make 'Mies Julie' resonate, but director Shariffa Ali never quite drives the heady electricity and malicious, unresolvable hurt of the story home...The strength of this 'Mies Julie' lies in Kibler and Udom’s chemistry and in their ability to keep finding the contradictions in the characters. Strindberg’s plays were always more human and complex than his analyses of his own writing."
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"Directed by Shariffa Ali with stingingly harsh vigor and acted with like impact...While Ms. Ali’s staging is strong enough to give pleasure in its own right, I’m not sure why Classic Stage has opted to produce a modern commentary on a 19th-century classic that so few of its viewers will know save by reputation...The audience would have been better served had the producers stuck to Strindberg."
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"Udon and Kibler make thrilling stage partners, pushing uncomfortable physical and emotional boundaries to their breaking points under Ali's bold direction. The tragic ending may be as preordained as that in 'The Dance of Death,' but rather than watching in woeful resignation, 'Mies Julie' makes you want to reach onto the stage (like the legendary Vinie Burrows in her ghostly cameo) and change the social architecture that's signed its characters' fates."
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“A tense and sizzling production...The setting is moved to the Karoo of South Africa on the 18th Anniversary of Freedom Day...Passions and social politics meet nose to nose...Their rough, but consensual, sexual encounter, staged with striking realism by fight and intimacy directors Alicia Rodis and Claire Warden, carries the same symbolism that the source's author conveyed less graphically in the 19th Century, though with the added layer brought on by the pair's racial divide."
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"Benefits from a director with a vivid, gripping vision and a cast willing to burrow deep into dark psychological corners; together, they make a compelling case for plays that often come across as creaky fulminations by a great writer...If Ali's taut direction never slackens across the seventy-five-minute running time, her production also benefits from the steamy pairing of Kibler and James Udom...The best argument in some time for the continuing relevance of his plays."
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"Farber has found a smart way to spin on 'Miss Julie'...Making the bold transition, she is able not only to stress the sexual politics of the explosive play but introduce a more profound political perspective...Director Ali’s actors are superb...When a playwright decides to fiddle with well-loved plays, it’s often a problem, but here’s a rare example of a truly authoritative spin."
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