The Visit NYC Reviews and Tickets

"'The Visit' only rarely shakes off a stasis that suggests a carefully carved mausoleum frieze. Nor does the show ever quite make peace between its uneasily twinned strands of merciless cynicism and a softer sentimentality...'That 'The Visit' still holds the attention has much to do with Ms. Rivera’s command of the stage...'The Visit' may in part be about the cruel price that life exacts if you stick around long enough. But Ms. Rivera adds a savory note of triumph to that bitter lesson."
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"It remains fascinating and alluring, if finally repetitive and frustrating...For all its flaws, though, you would never say the cast and crew of this often hypnotizing, eerie experiment were driven by fear or the lust for lucre."
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"The better the songs are, the weirder the show gets. There is, it seems to me, something ultimately incompatible in the marriage of this prime example of the European absurd and American show-must-go-on razzmatazz. Alienation and gregariousness make strange co-stars, but then so did Kander and Ebb. What a joy to have them back on Broadway and to think that, even half-dead, they’re unkillable."
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"A second-tier Kander and Ebb score is better than a lot of musical craftsmen's best, which makes 'The Visit' a welcome curiosity...The funereal show's shortage of tonal variation makes it harder to love...One of the production's rewards is the thrilling choral singing and exquisitely textured harmonies. But unquestionably, the reason to see 'The Visit' even with its flaws is the star."
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"The show is more literary piece than conventional musical. But it has a dark, sinister beauty...It begins well and ends well, but sags in the middle."
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"This production was worth the wait...'The Visit' is a cynical tragicomedy whose score is as gorgeous as its heart is hard. If that’s your cup of arsenic, you’ve come to the right apothecary...'The Visit' isn’t for everyone. But Mr. Kander and his late, lamented partner never wrote a finer score, and if you find that there isn’t much kick in the milk of human kindness, then you’ll thrill to their cruel tale of what men who dare to call themselves decent will do to one another if the price is right."
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"The show has deepened greatly...Kander’s music has never stopped evolving in its beauty, complexity and breadth, and the melodies here get under your skin even if the lyrics are not up to Ebb’s best. McNally’s compressed book does the job elegantly. I can’t imagine this show appealing to a Broadway audience seeking upbeat thrills, but I’m glad it finally made it here."
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"It remains a weird musical...this show most assuredly deserves to be here, if feeling, music and craft are the perennial guideposts. Sometimes they just take you to strange, difficult places, as they should."
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"This isn’t their strongest score, though even average Kander and Ebb is still better than most of the dreck out there...The show sports many such oddball touches...you may find yourself wishing Rivera could also go on forever."
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"Revenge is a dish served tepid in “The Visit.” The warmth hobbles this stark musical fable by John Kander, Fred Ebb and Terrence McNally. With this team, the show is certainly worthwhile. But it could really send shivers — and doesn’t. 'The Visit' pulls its punches...Wildcat? No. Claire and 'The Visit' are too domesticated for their own good."
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"The score is weak, dreary and derivative of Kander and Ebb's earlier work...Doyle's streamlined and ultra-stylized production is visually striking, but perhaps too ghoulish for its own good -- to the point of being excessively creepy and gloomy."
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"All the veteran talent yields decidedly mixed results...Kander and Ebb's music is quite lovely...The story, however, struck me as uncompellingly grim and confused...This yellow-hued show can't decide if it's a tragedy, a romance or a Brechtian comedy."
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"It’s a dark, macabre and evocative production...'The Visit' may not be one for the average theatergoer (although it should be) but is one of those esoteric secrets that fill the cognoscenti with excitement."
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"Death becomes her. Or not...A dismally depressing one-act musical...After about 90 minutes of gloom and doom one wishes that the whole show could be sealed up and buried six feet under."
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"At its best, the musical provokes some disturbing questions, and offers a kind of gruesome, Expressionist beauty. But it may also disappoint and confuse...If the outcome is predictable, the events unfold in layers that are inventive and often surprising."
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"This brilliant musical is a James Ensor painting drained of most colors, and the mix of John Kander’s riffs and plaintive ballads suit that dark vision to perfection...The gift of Kander and Ebb’s score is that it never sentimentalizes the material, but rather deepens our understanding of Claire’s motive and her shared tragedy with Anton...Fans of the American musical have much to be thankful for this season."
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"Kander's melodies and Ebb's lyrics are even chillier here...Yet there is also an oddly sentimental streak in this 'Visit'...Rivera can't help but be a transcendent force. Her presence alone makes 'The Visit' worth the trip."
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"'The Visit' is a haunting, haunted knot of Expressionist storytelling, a masterly 100-minute powerhouse with liltingly gruesome songs that create their own macabre world unlike anything onstage in recent memory...The chamber work has the feel of a dark European fable -- albeit one with timeless theatricality. The music is woozy with disturbing dance rhythms."
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"Never trust a woman who travels with her own coffin. That's one big takeaway from 'The Visit,' the thought-provoking and bizarre musical...Do everything in your powers to avoid having the ending spoiled. It will be bliss to sit through 'The Visit' asking the question that’s clearly supposed to be on our minds: What would we do if we were one of those people in Brachen?"
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I loved it...Terrence McNally’s book and the Kander and Ebb score have turned what could have been murky and painful to watch, into a melodic and adult story of true love gone wrong and it is mesmerizing...I found it moving and resoundingly satisfying...Anyone truly moved by great theatre will enjoy this."
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"Trust a John Kander-Fred Ebb musical to make the sunny color of vitality and youth positively menacing. In the dark, thrilling show, 'The Visit,' shoes, money and even tennis rackets turn yellow...'The Visit' is sophisticated and beautiful and yet has that typical glorious chilling view of man you expect from a Kander and Ebb show...It can visit anytime."
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"Super weird plot with haunting music and eerie direction by John Doyle. Oh, and there’s eunuchs. To me, it falls flat, and rather than engaging with the material I just sat back in wonder at just how weird it all was."
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"For 90 minutes of ecstatic storytelling, you are transported...It is the best, most important, musical currently playing on Broadway...If you embrace it and let it engulf you, you will be richly rewarded. This is first-rate in every way and, more importantly for the life of the musical form, an invigorating – but shattering – new direction."
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"The score by Kander and Ebb is workman-like with occasional flourishes of cynicism and bite. However, persistently, this is an underwhelming group of songs that never rises to the heights the duo has so consistently delivered in the past...John Doyle’s direction is serviceable... a reserved and slender piece of musical theater."
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"The production is on the smaller scale of Broadway musicals, but it is beautifully done by director John Doyle...Oftentimes the later work of composers isn't as good as their younger output. Thankfully, 'The Visit' is not that case! These songs are some of their best!"
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"'The Visit' is a dark, adult chamber musical with an intriguing blend of vengeance and romance...For fans of Rivera, this production is simply unmissable...Kander and Ebb have written an instantly accessible, highly romantic score...Strong support comes from the whole company."
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"The form is fascinating, as are the central issues and the strangeness of the piece...But the book and lyrics can be blunt and redundant...despite its shortcomings, it's intriguing to see Kander and Ebb create this world, an odd dystopia where a kickline and jazz hands have their place."
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"An essential visit for anyone who cherishes the rare and endangered species of the Broadway musical goddess. And there’s no fault to be found within the rest of a top-line cast...Yet in its previous incarnations, “The Visit” never knocked anyone’s socks off. “Honorable but conflicted” remains a fair verdict...“The Visit” is probably in better shape than it ever has been or will be...it seems a shame for this one not to ride on to greater glory."
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"A revamped and much-shortened version that proves often entertaining but only occasionally captivating. This elegiac production’s commercial potential is iffy, but the plot’s morality conundrum is surefire and theater faithful will certainly want to revisit, if only to see Rivera in a juicy starring role."
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"After 14 years of shaping, structuring and re-writing, it’s hammering audiences to their seats again, under the careful direction of John Doyle, in the best condition since its musical inception...A story of cutting cynicism with the twisted theme--in a corrupt world, you always get the kind of justice you can afford--is more relevant than ever...Don’t delay. Motor, hitchhike or bike it up to the picture postcard Berkshires pronto, and see this unforgettable production of The Visit before it gets to Broadway."
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"The complex contours and ambiguities of these themes, however, are not probed nearly as deeply here as in the iconic duo's earlier masterpieces. From the moment Claire throws down the vengeful gauntlet, the people of Brachen all but promise to live up to their morally blemished reputations...The production has yet to strike the magic combination of musical and dramatic elements that will make the shadows of Claire Zachanassian's "visit" continue to linger."
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"The new, fascinating and successful rendering of The Visit benefits from rethinking the musical as well as classic performance...There is not anything easy about The Visit. One senses despair and decay even entering the theater. To be certain, Kander and Ebb give us some amazing and atypical music. The cast is superb. Then, there is the morality, or lack of—the central theme which rests beneath the entirety of this musical.—all of this within about 100 minutes of theater."
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"After more than a dozen years of stumbling blocks to keep it from a Broadway run, this stunningly musicalized, dark yet not without humor story has finally found a more than possible way to reach its intended destination...And to support director John Doyle's strikingly effective new concept of The Visit in the format of a one-act opera, there's a superb cast and design team."
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"It's not just lean, it's anorexic. Other than the two leading characters, everyone seems like a cartoon cutout. I respect economical writing and understand the use of archetypes but it seems out of balance with the human and romantic aspects it clearly wants to make...but the musical has much to be admired, several terrific numbers and a fine ensemble."
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"The Visit is an engrossing meditation, somber and darkly funny by turns, on love gone wrong, on the slippery slope of human morality once greed enters the picture, on revenge, corruption, and hypocrisy...A passionate heart beats inside “The Visit,’’ for all its formal innovation and chilly beauty."
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"McNally, Kander and Ebb have provided the blueprint. Director John Doyle, who is new to this 15-year-old project, has filled it in with masterly theatrical invention and style. I’ve not seen the longer original version but it feels to me that Doyle’s compression of the show into 90 intermissionless minutes is exacty right. It has the paradoxical effect of expanding the material by sharpening its focus and plunging deeper into the characters without wasteful flourish or excess."
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"Fully realized in its visual and dramatic power, “The Visit” is being presented in an extraordinary, reconceived production...Soaked in rich examinations of human greed and venality, the pernicious creep of fascism and group-think rationalizations, “The Visit” is an engrossing effort. It’s probably too grim and peculiar to enjoy a long Broadway run — it is, after all, fundamentally a love story about a murder motivated by money — but it deserves a far wider audience than it’s so far received."
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