"Brantley: 'What’s so thrilling about this exposure of what lies beneath is that you feel it was always there, waiting to be excavated'...Green: 'This has always been a very American story, of course, but has never felt like so much of one until now...Mostly Mr. Fish is audacious in ways that feel dead-on and delightful'...Brantley: 'The casting is spot-on and often illuminating...Green: ''Oklahoma!' is a rollicking good time: The jokes have never been funnier, the merry songs merrier.'"
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“A powerful revival...Some comedy remains but even that has an edge of danger...While it looks and sounds very different...the production doesn’t fight with the text. Fish’s vision treats Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical with deep respect, shining a hard light on its underlying issues of justice, violence, and the autonomy of women. It ventures into rough territory and leaves the show in a brand-new state.”
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"Without sacrificing the show’s humor or the beauty of its music, Fish and his company have created a charged, scary production, a story about the aggressions and ambiguities entwined deep in the root system of America...One of Fish’s vital interpretive strokes is to emphasize both Curly’s cruel streak and Laurey’s ambivalence, drawing out her emotional struggle as the heart of the play."
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"Screaming with directorial ideas and concepts, some of which work and many others that don't, the production feels more like a doctoral thesis...Purists will be appalled and fans of experimental theater will be thrilled...The book and score are largely unchanged but the musical somehow feels much longer despite its conventional running time...While a lesser musical might benefit from such reinterpretation, Rodgers & Hammerstein's classic work, revolutionary for its time, really doesn't."
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"The world Fish and his designers create is stark but not uninviting...It’s an 'Oklahoma!' that sounds lovely and earns its laughs and heartache honestly, even if tempi slow to a crawl...Fish gives us more. He gets between the lines, finds the gray areas of ambiguity and fear that complicate the aw-shucks rom-com...Sexy, suspenseful and with a fresh, exuberant sound, this is an 'Oklahoma!' to hoot and cheer and stomp your boots at."
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"Fish’s stripped-down, rough-edged revamp...The mood is relaxed and casual. There is little separation between the audience and the actors...Distinguishing Fish’s production is a pervading ominous tone. Although Fish does not appear to have altered the lyrics or dialogue, he has radically remade 'Oklahoma!'...For the most part, this proves to be an intriguing and compelling interpretation...A far from definitive but refreshing 'Oklahoma!'"
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“A radical reworking of Rodgers & Hammerstein...Fish is deconstructing the work down to its bones, bringing out flavor notes in the text that we've, in the past, willfully chosen to ignore...Fish has emphasized the aspects of the piece that speak to 2018...What makes this production so fascinating is the way we recognize those more incendiary elements as if for the first time...Not all the elements here work...Ultimately, though, Fish's excavation of ‘Oklahoma!’ is essential viewing.”
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"If this 'Oklahoma!' roils with disruptive emotions and suggestions of brutality, most of the time everyone involved seems to be taking Rodgers and Hammerstein at their word, highlighting the darkness in the script and score. The production features two moments of possible overreach...In addition, a number of things don't quite work...Still, this is a starkly original exercise that is well worth your attention -- often musically beguiling, rife with tension, and loaded with laughter."
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