Sweat

"Bracingly topical...Though it is steeped in social combustibility, 'Sweat' often feels too conscientiously assembled, a point-counterpoint presentation in which every disaffected voice is allowed its how-I-got-this-way monologue...'Sweat' is best at its muddiest, when love and hate, and the urges to strike out and to comfort, teeter in precipitous balance. That’s when Ms. Nottage’s characters, and the cast members who embody them, emerge in their full tragic humanity." Full Review

"All of the performances feel bigger, suggesting that director Kate Whoriskey has instructed her cast to play to the back row of this much larger Broadway house. Unfortunately, results vary...Even though some of the performances have gone astray, 'Sweat' is still the must-see play of the season. Nottage employs her ample intelligence and compassion in telling the story of why so many Americans feel frustrated and frightened." Full Review

"A tense and finely acted production...Day and Wilson do excellent work playing the subtext of racial tension...While the decline of American communities when jobs are sent to other countries is a familiar subject, Nottage's even-handed treatment of multiple viewpoints, giving sympathy to all sides, makes 'Sweat' a truly realistic and moving tragedy that, sadly, has gained relevance on its way to Broadway." Full Review

"Nottage’s passionate and necessary drama is a masterful depiction of the forces that divide and conquer us...Director Kate Whoriskey’s fluid and propulsive staging benefits from an excellent cast led by the fearless triad of Johanna Day, Michelle Wilson and Alison Wright...'Sweat' communicates its points with minimal fuss and maximum grit. Along with the rage, despair and violence, there's humor and abundant humanity." Full Review

"Nottage’s slice-of-lifer is moving and impactful even if the plot is somewhat melodramatic, thanks to Whoriskey’s detailed direction and the cast’s compassionate performances...Nottage’s script feelingly captures the plight of the working class...Yet too much of the action feels like a checklist as topics such as immigration and automation are crossed off...The play probably would have been more powerful if Nottage had not created such an obviously theatrical, tear-jerking finish." Full Review

“Significant but unavoidably depressing...Sweat' is...naturalistic drama, its dialogue prosaic and profane...It's more the dramatization of a condition than of an action...The play becomes a sequence of disputes forcing us to accept the barroom as...a crucible of overheated temperament...'Sweat' dramatizes a real national tragedy with careful attention to detail but it breaks no new ground, tells us nothing we didn't already know, and suggests no way out.” Full Review

"Nottage has not done a lot of complex narrative crafting here. But what she has done is strong and smart, and addresses the many simmering tensions on which the play is constructed...Nottage does not shy from exploring, occasionally in brutal fashion, how America's ever-evolving work life changes the souls of those who are subjected to it. 'Sweat' ultimately feels real because the people in it who are sweating feel real...Whoriskey's staging is fluid, sharp, and honest." Full Review

"No play on Broadway addresses the political climate more immediately than 'Sweat'....Other productions this season have had superlative ensembles, but none is more prominent than this one. The details, small and large, filled in by each cast member are heart-throbbing. So much of this creativity in performance, of course, has to be attributed to director Kate Whoriskey...'Sweat' is a first-rate achievement." Full Review

"A worthy attempt to put serious material before a wider public...What it isn’t, I’m sorry to say, is a great play; though improved in some ways, it remains pretty much as I found it downtown: gripping but disappointing...There’s a checklist quality to the dramaturgy that begins to feel obligatory...Great drama takes place in the space between people. The interplay of ideas can of course be a part of that, but only a part. Characters aren’t pundits, and plots aren’t treatises." Full Review

"Lynn Nottage’s timely, empathetic and critical-minded drama...An involving drama, calibrated to increase in intensity toward its brutal climax. Nottage explores her characters and their environment with the sensitivity of a master dramatist and the objectivity of a journalist...Kate Whoriskey’s finely textured production is a triumph of ensemble acting. Johanna Day is particularly effective in expressing her character’s shock, frustration and self-centered ego." Full Review

"The play grabs you with its ripped-from-the-headlines social and political resonance. It also loses its grip due to predictability and a miscalibrated staging...It is not a pretty picture. But it is as straight-up and real as it gets. Too bad performances frequently don’t ring true in director Kate Whoriskey’s staging. Too often actors don't look and sound like people talking, but performers emoting. It becomes distracting and pulls you out of the story." Full Review

"The cast is excellent with Wilson and Davis standing out. Whoriskey’s direction is ploddingly slow in the first act, but picks up in the second...Though much of this show is believable, who seriously wants to watch this? I don’t mean to sound heartless, because this is a reality for some parts of the country. Sadly we never really get to know the personal relationships of these characters...This may be an important play, but I do not see this drawing an audience." Full Review

"Ferociously engrossing...'Sweat' never feels less than authentic — and crucial. That said, 'Sweat' still suffers from preachiness and some stilted writing that raise the volume and add exclamation points where none are necessary. This seems to have worsened in the expansion to a Broadway house, where the speechifying too often registers as harangue...These are not inconsequential flaws, but timeliness and Nottage’s uncommon empathy for each of these characters ultimately prevail." Full Review

“Few great American plays take place in a bar. Nottage’s heart-wrenching 'Sweat' may well be the best one since O’Neill’s 'The Iceman Cometh'...As tightly operating an ensemble as you are ever likely to see on Broadway…Whoriskey directs with a sure hand, with minor flourishes...and major accomplishments like keeping the pacing of inevitable doom at a compelling slow bleed. This, along with Beatty’s perfectly wrought set featuring functioning beer taps, leave us thirsting for more.” Full Review

"The play is more relevant and timely than ever...The transfer overall is just fine with the entire team back on board (with just one new cast member)...The actors are better than ever...I still find the play's structure and conflicts too schematic and familiar to really tap into my deepest emotions until late in the second act. However, this seemed less important this time around...'Sweat' is now a worthy heir to Arthur Miller's American Dream destroying 'Death of a Salesman.'" Full Review

"Inarguably a schematic socialist drama that clearly decided in advance what it wanted to say about the state of the nation. Its conclusion is not a surprise. But—and, along with a mordant wit, this is its mitigating strength and greatest asset—'Sweat' also is a moral, passionate and richly articulated cri de coeur from one of America's leading African-American playwrights...'Sweat,' which is performed with relentless commitment and respect, feels very much of the moment." Full Review

"The difficulty with 'Sweat' is that these characters seem to be stock composites of all those the playwright interviewed and they are not all likeable...They are not believable and therefore, their conflicts–as important as those are–seem less than engaging and authentic...Under Kate Whoriskey’s uneven direction, the cast of 'Sweat'–except Mr. Albán and Mr. Colby–deliver flat performances. They are not fully to blame, however: the story line is predictable." Full Review

"It still packs a wallop, this hard-edged play...What the sure-to-be Tony nominated director Kate Whoriskey has done with Nottage’s words is to not shy away from the horribleness that can surface in all of our collective hearts...Even knowing the final outcome of 'Sweat,' the power and the discomfort is still epically visceral and disconcerting...But the very last scene still feels a bit heavy-handed and the one startling component that remains implausible and manipulative." Full Review

"Nottage eloquently captures the malaise among a group of longtime coworkers at a Berks County, Pennsylvania, mill...'Sweat' should be hailed for its visceral performance by Johanna Day...'Sweat' positively smokes through its two-hour-plus run...Nottage obviously hit on something vital in her research—with 20/20 hindsight. 'Sweat' gives off a tangible vibe, and if some better understood the issues raised by this play before the election, they wouldn’t have been surprised by the outcome." Full Review

"Meticulously researched and populated with both realistic dialogue and true-to-life characters...A gripping tale of friendships gone wrong and prejudice run amok...Stunningly staged by Whoriskey and enacted by a flawless ensemble...Nottage has a glorious way with language...Her one major dramaturgical flaw here is not just the overwhelming amount of exposition in the play, but how clumsily it sometimes gets handled. But ultimately, Nottage succeeds in her mission." Full Review

“A prescient study of an American dream gone belly up…How they each interact is portrayed in finely nuanced detail not only in dialogue but through performance and Kate Whoriskey’s sensitive and solid direction. This is a well-honed ensemble…The performers, all but one, reprising their roles from the Off-Broadway production, are excellent...If it seems overly ambitious, it is nonetheless a powerful chronicle of a modern day tragedy." Full Review

"Nottage bottles a flammable brand of white working-class resentment and spills it, in its superheated state, all over the stage. Audiences will readily recognize the vitriol unleashed in Nottage’s timely if too plodding drama...Its best moments anatomize the friendship among three women in the plant. How their camaraderie disintegrates is a far more nuanced bit of storytelling than the standard-issue crime-procedural track that 'Sweat' ultimately shifts onto." Full Review

"Under Kate Whoriskey’s direction, this is pulled off with a lot of energy and surprising humor—the characters don’t seem to have a lot of introspective time—and a game cast gives it extra heft. Best of all are the three lead women as figures in an embattled landscape, navigating through it while trying to survive. Nottage won the Pulitzer for 'Ruined,' and with this, her first Broadway play, she’s achieved something earnest but worthwhile." Full Review

"'Sweat' gives poignant voice to a disenfranchised microcosm of the American heartland, as if Michael Moore’s Flint, Michigan had taken center stage. A fine ensemble is featured under Kate Whoriskey’s expert direction." Full Review

"Director Kate Whoriskey and Nottage have partnered before, and it shows. Words and actions move in lockstep. Everything seems organic. Whoriskey’s assembled a crackerjack cast, and they deliver bigtime. You never doubt these Pennsylvanians have worked together, played together, and bent many an elbow together. Touching and troubling, 'Sweat' is a powerful potion that candidly explores a piece of the American dream no longer worth dreaming." Full Review