Juan A. Ramirez

“For what is clearly one of the past decade’s most loved plays, this Broadway debut is a beautiful homecoming.”

“Debbie Allen’s revival of the 1984 drama boasts a compelling cast, led by Taraji P Henson and Cedric the Entertainer, but too many notes are off.”

“It's perfectly harmless, and just as forgettable.”

“The century-old play holds up marvelously, and its two leads don’t waste a drop of opportunity for drunken laughs.”

“Much of this, as in Versailles, is due to the multiplicity of voices she admits into her storytelling; a keystone of documentaries’ allowance of real people to say their piece, but a tactic that typically muddles dramatic coherence.”

“Second Stage, which produced its off-Broadway premiere, has brought it back for a Broadway premiere that's damn near perfect.”

“It’s essentially Disney for Dads, a curious blend of head-patting nostalgia and earnest artistry, delivered with a refreshing lack of cynicism.”

“That some 50 minutes later Radcliffe would have me, along with the rest of the crowd, stand up to do the wave without an ounce of cynicism speaks to his extraordinary charm as a performer.”

“Plays hardly come as astutely, or productions as perceptive as this – and rarely anyone as brilliantly as Squibb.”

“But I should've known from its twee little title that this would not be for me, and I was unfortunately correct.”

“His Oedipus, while glowing with his usual whip-smart language, doesn't have much fun in the toppling.”

“Once the protagonists arrive at their reconciliatory table, you understand why this is a story worth telling, and there’s not a dry eye in the house.”

“Their relationship is built to last, even in a Buñuelian hellscape that will, we know, keep going and going.”

“There is just no believing that such a situation could happen in as culturally impoverished and illiterate a place as the United States in 2025, where this production is firmly based in spirit.”

“Real Women is best when allowing them to flesh out their relationships, through punchlines heartily landed, or when following Ana's budding journalism career.”

“Floyd Collins is an odd piece which, staged, asks a little too hard that we mine through dense earth to reach its goal. But this Broadway premiere makes a solid case for its beauty, found through a gorgeous score that draws opera from Americana.”

“John Proctor Is the Villain is much like that: a heady rush of glee, shock and understanding that takes you by surprise, and leaves you happy you came.”

“Smash has a ruthlessness that’s hard to believe exists in the PR’d universe of modern theater, and it does sometimes curdle. There’s an ickiness to Ivy’s story, where a woman attempting to self-actualize and improve herself is treated as an impediment.”

“Hurtling towards us through metaphysical universes and a sometimes bumpy production, Rogers arrives fully-formed: a star.”

“But for all its subdued rippling, his play of Good Night, and Good Luck charts mostly still waters.”

“Polished, starry, and with nothing to say, this Glengarry sells a McMansion, neither a scam nor a Palace.”

“Though Leon’s two previous Shakespearean outings, both at the Delacorte, had specific takes on character and setting, there is nothing powering his Othello, leaving its two blockbuster leads, Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal, stranded.”

“Each performance is exquisitely tuned, and though its second act spends too long on the reverberations of its perfect first, this is drama at its finest.”

“But none of its ideas or characters are given space to coalesce into anything meaningful, with blandly inspirational songs crowding out an ecosystem that would better thrive on more organic soil.”

“McDonald’s monumental performance and Wolfe’s intelligent staging make this an essential entry into the revival canon, and a production not to be missed.”

“But though the onstage dialogue is largely irrelevant – they might as well be saying “rhubarb rhubarb,” I confirmed with the script later – I still felt I was robbed of a live experience.”

“At the heart of Cult of Love is a bleak acknowledgement of the current existential impasse in the fight for America’s soul.”

“The forces which drive a man to his basest survival instincts would make for compelling theatre but, again, the musical keeps insight at bay.”

“The history is fascinating, and this show is not altogether unenjoyable, but Tammy Faye’s creators simply haven’t cracked it.”

“This is a very special show; a tender, visionary ode to the space we're able to create and hold for feeling, and the hope that it may continue.”

“It's all a very pleasant surprise that this Romeo + Juliet is more akin to Skins than expected: wildly enjoyable, acutely contemporary, potently acted.”

“He seems to share an existential grief with Parson’s Stage Manager, and the production strikes a similarly melancholy tone.”

“But his McNeal is as wandering and ineffective as the play itself.”

“Jez Butterworth's latest play, directed by Sam Mendes and imported from a London run earlier this year, is never less than compelling, well-executed and performed.”

“Her Mary Jane – a triumph, if one that points to better stage outings to come – is no different.”

“Lacking detail and focus, Patriots is a character study without much of either.”

“Surprisingly, it’s Wayne Brady as The Wiz who underwhelms; his entrance is surprisingly lowkey, and though his voice is serviceably charming, it’s leagues behind his co-stars. His shoddy throne throws a glaring light on the production’s prudence of grandeur. The real riches are in the cast’s connection to each other, and to the material.”

“Truth be told, I was not expecting to be as bowled over by this story, or this revival, as I was. But there’s no arguing with talent, and with so much prowess on and off the stage, Tommy is an electric paean to rock immortality, and talent wherever one can find it.”

“Amy Herzog’s watered-down adaptation was already a lost cause.”

“A shrug from a tear-stained shoulder is certainly not the worst way to exit a musical, so even if The Notebook isn’t reinventing any wheels, it turns them with earnest, somehow not-too-sentimental, precision.”

“It’s tempting to chalk this up to Ryan’s last-minute substitution for Tyne Daly, who bowed out as the production began previews. And though, perhaps, some time will benefit the production, it seems impossible to fault Ryan, who is soul-shakingly effective.”

“The subject matter is almost corrosively downbeat but, with its two leads at the top of their game, the one-act musical becomes a cathartic, deeply felt tonic.”

“Appropriate is a masterwork the likes of which crop up a handful of times per generation.”

“But alas, as with many other whose near-two-decade cobwebs were only lightly dusted off, I was left to consume a number about a character’s coming out that, until the final moments when a few Grindr beeps came through, comprised what a 2005 straight man’s idea of gayness was like.”

“Yet the searching depth of this finale cannot make up for a broadly unfulfilling work.”

“Very little of the dialogue is of particular significance and, whether made to feel improvised or simply under-rehearsed by the cast, has a meandering quality that quickly becomes grating.”

“The humor in Gutenberg! could stand to be a bit more like the rat-infested streets upon which the meta-show’s characters walk, and a certain nastiness could have elevated this from good to great.”

“But, like the shark itself, the play’s essential functions scarcely work — save for the few scenes in which the three men, caught in an epochal shift in acting and celebrity, wax poetic about the fall of fathers, the impotence of sons, and the rolling tides of art.”

“Sandy Rustin's The Cottage, which has been making its rounds through regional theatres before landing at Broadway's Hayes Theatre, is a well-crafted comedy with simple, sturdy laughs.”

“Arriving at the Broadway Theatre, Here Lies Love proves itself more than a gimmick, or an Obama-era flash in the pan: it’s a spectacular look at celebrity, vanity, and power, undergirded by a nonstop parade of danceable, singable hits.”

“But this can only go so far, and it’s not long before New York, New York starts to feel like a Radio City Music Hall pageant rather than an actual book musical.”

“Linney and Hecht’s confident, vulnerable-lite performances are the reasons to come, and the two stage veterans embrace the audience with their affable warmth and charm.”

“Like this production, it proves that a gifted performer can lift the spirit against all odds.”

“Prima Facie is a masterclass in sophistication, thoughtfulness, and brevity; the platonic ideal of a night at the theatre.”

“But without a distinct point of view, its bottom line of “Thanksgiving is problematic” renders it only a pleasant, toothless, pilgrimage to the theatre.”

“Who knew going wrong would feel so right?”

“If this Camelot is a bit confused on whether it wants to be a majestic golden age musical or a gritty take on the shaky foundations of a monarchical ménage à trois, it pulls through on the strength of its cast, which tightly brings the work’s brief shining moment into glorious light.”

“Shucked is about as quick and easy a good time can be had on Broadway: accessible, unpretentious and, I’ll be damned, a whole lot of fun.”

“Bring the kids, bring the edibles, and prepare to have your ship gently rocked.”

“The powerful musical is a reminder that theatre is a beautiful art form that can speak so eloquently to the current times.”

“Pictures From Home creates an often moving portrait of family as an uncapturable, captivating subject.”

“Each character is as thin as a Campbell’s soup label, but the insistence to ask these rote questions, then cop out of answering any when they turn to why the street artist himself is so comfortable with his funds is frustrating.”

“After a while, even his cantankerous comedy and silent currents of emotion can’t bring this dreary play north of a puzzled, heavy eye-lidded look.”

“Now at the Booth Theatre after what felt like a lifetime of anticipation, it arrives on Broadway not only unscathed, but even better, proving itself one of the greatest musicals of our time, and something close to a miracle.”

“It is a production so dull, with poor direction, ugly sets, uninteresting music, and flat performances, that it really needn’t exist at all.”

“Fiennes is great, of course, but the play goes nowhere.”

“It is, unfortunately, not a very good play.”

“But its hurried second act doesn’t deliver on the first’s more in-depth investigations of class, ethnicity, and of who gets to escape versus who must stay in a decaying country.”

“Gold’s production underplays everyone’s emotions to the point of nothingness.”

“What is surprising, given that no one really asked for this, and considering the general soullessness of such reboots, is how perfectly charming and entertaining the work is.”

“Hangmen is the kind of play we don't really see anymore.”

“It’s not an ideal production, but if you can focus on the words themselves rather than the other stimuli thrown your way, it remains essential, vivid, and affirming.”

“Mary-Louise Parker has, quite frankly, never been better, and her chemistry with Morse is enough reason to commit the production to celluloid history.”

“Birthday Candles is an expositional attempt to reconcile humanity’s smallness with the universe’s grandness.”

“This convincingly-acted, blistering drama more than earns its championship title.”

“Is this the next Phantom or Les Miserables?”

“It’s mediocrity, baldly served on a silver platter for golf claps.”

“Everything onstage is pure Broadway gold, fine-tuned to the gods and played to the back of the house.”

“But as Jackson says in the second act, “We have the icing, but it doesn’t mean anything unless the cake tastes good,” and no amount of frosting could make this amoral mud pie any easier to swallow.”

“Morriseau has created a brilliant, modern workplace tragedy, masterfully attuned to the ways the American Dream has made sleepwalkers of us all.”

“But alas, the startling contradictions and dazzling talents that made legends out of Huxley, Luce, and Grant are left unexplored by Lapine’s thudding book, and are rendered tediously monotone in Kitt and Korie’s score, which neither mirrors nor rebels against its time period’s soundscapes.”

“A miscast Bobbie aside, there is very little to complain about in this excellent production of one of Sondheim’s most dynamic works, created at a time when the writer-composer was transitioning from the Golden Age that raised him into the postmodern theatre he helped create.”

“If this engaging production leaves out a few garnishes, it still serves up a finger-licking good time with a few stirring insights on the side.”

“The gravitas, lived experience, and magisterial presence she brings to the role is worth the ticket price alone, and makes a fantastic case for an immediate revival of Gypsy.”

“And, well, it is the most fun I’ve had in a theatre in a long, long time.”

“The play just sort of starts and ends, without fanfare or adornment, and yet, in its heightened presentation of reality, emerges as one of the most radical works on Broadway.”

“The songs are, without hyperbole, miracles of modern musical theatre: completely, line-by-line relevant to what is happening onstage while maintaining a universal pop appeal that can play without context.”

“Because of course traumatic violence must appear––for all its sharp performances and often brilliant depiction of Black hope and hopelessness, little happens that can’t be seen from a mile away.”

“The musical adaptation is a visual feast that captures the gothic whimsy of the original.”

“Lloyd’s final directorial choice is a masterclass in unearned bravado; one that, with its self-conscious showiness, undermines the dramatic force Ibsen and Chastain have managed to summon.”

“There’s nothing wrong with plays in which not much happens, but with Laurence Fishburne, Sam Rockwell, and Darren Criss up for sale, there’s no reason for this Neil Pepe-directed revival to lowball an audience this badly.”

“I'll cave to having been won over by its in-your-face enchantment.”

“This production stakes a claim for the musical as an essential classic, iconic in both its scope and execution.”

“Still, with the cast having this much fun onstage, it’s hard not to feel like part of the family, and Chicken & Biscuits is comfort food worth reheating.”

“The production’s tone – especially as seen through Arnulfo Maldonado’s down-home set and Dede Ayite’s nostalgic costumes – is likewise consistent, if to a fault.”

“That spark is what makes Lackawanna probably the most honest show in New York right now: 90 minutes of earnest, unsentimental love for one’s past.”

“There’s hardly a better one to leave his mark on the neighborhood and, at least with this production, save it from becoming the existential cul-de-sac it threatens to become.”

“And yet here comes It Hot, blazing a three-alarm fire with charm and wit to remind us of the joys that beautiful people, electric performances, exciting choreography and foot-stomping, finger-snapping, neck-pulsing music can inspire.”

“Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends is a celebration of a fearless artist that is itself quite timid, a memorial piece that seems overly desperate to keep out the spectre of death. Once you accept the show’s limited ambitions, as I gradually did over the course of this pleasant and jauntily staged musical revue, you can let yourself to have a good time.”

“This is a first-rate production, with a luminous cast worth its weight in gold.”