Oslo (Broadway) NYC Reviews and Tickets
Member Reviews (818)
See it if You enjoy well done dramas documenting a true, controversial moment in history. Detailed and enlightening, maybe longer than necessary.
Don't see it if You're not interested in history plays. This one is very well done but it does go on for three hours. Lots of detail to get through.
See it if Tense historical reenactment of secret negotiations, and their human elements. Exciting, creative staging.
Don't see it if You are looking for something more personally meaningful. The show was enlightening but ultimately somewhat dry.
See it if you love great theater where both the words and the ideas they express matter. The thriller-like build of the plot is truly exciting.
Don't see it if political maneuvering bothers you. Also the constant moving of furniture between the many short scenes can be irritating.
See it if you want to see the perfect symmetry of a brilliant collaborative creative team portraying an historic collaborative effort to forge peace.
Don't see it if you have no interest whatsoever in international politics. [Tho even if you don't, you'll still be riveted by the well-written, taut drama.]
See it if J.T. Rogers again mines history to write absorbing docu-drama on an attempt to find peace in the Middle East Runs out of steam in last hour
Don't see it if Powerful work Sher's astute/austere direction real star here although ensemble shines as well Daniel Oreskes personal fav as Shimon Peres
See it if you like true stories, world politics, or heavy dramas.
Don't see it if you're in the mood for something light or are turned off by political themes.
See it if Grand production of polictical and historical drama. Serious document of PLO and Israel hammering out peace during talky and emotional meets
Don't see it if Very long and overwrought period drama that, although recent perhaps may be forgotten.
See it if you'd enjoy a political drama on the story behind the famous Rabin-Arafat handshake, w/a stellar cast (Azizi, Ehle, Mays, Schnetzer, etc.)
Don't see it if you can't abide slow-moving plays or will be salty this took the Tony over the superior A Doll's House, Part 2.
Critic Reviews (74)
"This rich drama of quixotic politics fills to the bursting point its capacious new home...'Oslo' has now become the colossus it was always meant to be, while giving an even sharper focus to the urgent behind-the-scenes intimacy at its fast-beating heart...A marvel of both expository efficiency and exciting showmanship...'Oslo' features a vast cast of characters...Yet somehow, by the end, this production’s vital ensemble makes you feel you have come to know every single one of them."
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"A testament to the potential value of diplomacy, cooperation, mutual recognition of opponents’ humanity and—contra the now-trending WikiLeaks ethos—backroom secrecy...Distinguished ensemble cast...Nearly three hours long, the play demands attentiveness and works hard to achieve it. In its bittersweet final swell of hopefulness and humanity, it rewards one of our most endangered virtues, in theater as well as in politics: patience."
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"'Oslo' turns the negotiations that led to the Israeli-Palestinian peace accord of 1993 into gripping human drama. To the extent that it does so by making diplomacy not just interesting but moving, it’s a wonder of savvy stagecraft and wily performance. It’s also, quite possibly, a lie...A large cast in which nearly everyone is a knockout...The history books will have to decide whether 'Oslo' is great drama or just—just!—a great evening of theater."
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"Bracing and absorbing...The production seems in constant, almost frantic, motion...Bits of dialogue teeter into speechifying here and there, but you’ll barely notice; the balance of passion, discipline, and suspense is organically, thrillingly theatrical...High stakes and hard choices tend to produce uncomfortable moments, but as this muscular, moving production reminds us, progress isn’t easy—even when it’s incomplete."
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“Unequivocally fascinating...Rogers’clever dialogue really is that witty. You get the facts, but you get them delivered with intelligence and humor by this dream of a cast. It’s the petty stuff—the pseudonyms, the clandestine phone calls, the drinking competitions, and all the other trappings of macho bravado—that makes these intimidating characters so human. And so funny...This is what we call drama, and it’s what we live for.”
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"The play is generally so smartly written...and the direction of Sher so taut that you are drawn in...If 'Oslo' means for us to recognize how important negotiations and close human contact are, I found myself agreeing but noting that they can also seduce and distort and that the arrogance of believing that you can venture out on your own and gamble with the lives of others is something not particularly deserving of praise. Aside from that though, the play fascinates."
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"The extraordinary 'Oslo,' Rogers’ riveting dramatization of a complex political tarantella...It’s even better the second time around...This all sounds talk-talky, and it is—which is what makes Sher’s accomplishment with the text so compelling...Rogers and Sher take the players in this comedy of terrors at face value, refusing to douse it in cynicism or the certainty of hindsight...For an all too brief moment, we can look back to that handshake and recall how thrilling hope can be."
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"Hands down the best new play of the season. Creating riveting drama out of the intransigence of implacable enemies is no modest trick, but darned if playwright J.T. Rogers doesn’t pull it off, and grandly. This story of a three-dimensional geopolitical chess match, told as if each player were a complete human being capable of passion, error, humor and honor, reveals the keen eye and ear of a writer working in veritable mind-melding harmony with a superb director, Bartlett Sher."
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