To Kill a Mockingbird (Broadway)

"Concerns about whether the script by Sorkin supports or subverts the novelist’s intentions are instantly allayed, with the audience held in rapt attention throughout. This stage Mockingbird is majestically triumphant...The soul and conscience of the 1960 novel virtually leap across the footlights...The Broadway 'Mockingbird' will likely leave a throb in your heart and a well of tears in your eyes." Full Review

“There is so much to admire in this beautiful production, from the source material to the adaptation, from the design to the direction, from the ensemble to the supporting cast. But 'To Kill a Mockingbird' simply would not work without a perfect Atticus Finch. Daniels is just that. This is a quiet, humble, profoundly intense tour de force performance...A performance that people will talk about for years to come...A play people will talk about for years to come. Don't miss this one.” Full Review

"It has been well publicized that the Harper Lee estate filed a lawsuit in February 2018 alleging that the play deviated too much from the novel. They should not have worried. As directed by Bartlett Sher, Sorkin's astutely scripted 'To Kill a Mockingbird' with Jeff Daniels as Atticus Finch is a magnificent and moving theatrical experience that treats the novel with respect and dignity. The additions and changes from the novel only make the material more stage worthy." Full Review

"Outstanding. That’s if 'outstanding' isn’t too mild an adjective to describe Sorkin’s accomplishment...He retains most of Lee’s important plot twists while introducing discreet, pointed alternative moments...As directed with immaculate care by Sher, Lee’s characters are well served on stage, first and foremost by Daniels...This is an astounding star turn...With all the first-rate work on display in this remarkable take on Lee’s masterpiece, patrons have much to mull as they exit the theater." Full Review

"The casting is better than perfect; it’s revelatory, with each actor serving both the novel’s humane vision and the nuances...It would be hard to imagine a more ideal Scout than the ageless Celia Keenan-Bolger, who imbues the precocious tomboy with all the intensity and wonder you’d expect...'Mockingbird’s' lessons may seem obvious, but like so many on offer at this moment, they also come across as depressingly timely and necessary." Full Review

“Peck was admirable as the character in the book and film, but Sorkin's country lawyer with a moral backbone that evolves. Daniels understands and communicates the layers of Atticus in this Broadway production. The sharp large cast is on target and brilliantly directed by Bartlett Sher...It is an uplifting, beautifully delivered production of American values at a time we could use it.” Full Review

"A great work of American theater...The cast is powerfully, convincingly, alive, both in Scout’s memory as she narrates and for us as these actors fully inhabit their roles...Daniels is splendid. He has added a trace of weakness and a whiff of shame to the lovable, admirable character...Sorkin’s script is deft as well as fine." Full Review

“The plethora of humor throughout the evening masks the pain and displeasure behind what the nexus of the play is about and it helps the two hours and 45 minutes move along smoothly...As far as the acting goes, they are all sensational but the night belonged to Keenan-Bolger...Sorkin gives us a great book and does not overtly accentuate the deep, depressing story line...Instead, he chooses humor and just the right amount of despair and desperation.” Full Review

"It’s a tricky, balancing act and Sorkin — in tandem with dynamic director Sher and a flawless acting ensemble — never loses sight of making Lee’s tale thrillingly alive on stage. Brimming with humor, generous heart and gritty provocation, 'To Kill a Mockingbird' is as timely as it is timeless...There’s genuine daring in this production...Sorkin lunges headlong into the fray. And, under Sher’s urgent direction, the experience is electrifying...Unmissable and unforgettable." Full Review

"Kudos belong, as well, to Kimberly Grigsby and Allan Tedder, who sit on the sides of Miriam Buether's spare yet evocative set, playing era-appropriate music by Tony Award winner Adam Guettel. But it's Sorkin's and Lee's words that make the sweetest music onstage, reminding us of the challenges of doing the right thing even in the toughest of circumstances. To do otherwise, like killing a mockingbird, would be a sin. As would be missing this sublime show." Full Review

"It's to Sorkin's credit that he lets the contemporary parallels emerge naturally, without hitting us over the head, in a transfixing act of theatrical storytelling graced by exceptional ensemble acting. Perhaps the most notable achievement of this thoughtful adaptation and makes us hang on every word as if experiencing the story for the first time...Even the riskiest choices pay off...This is theatrical storytelling so assured and involving it's hard to imagine anyone not being mesmerized." Full Review

"Far from killing the essence of the great work, this excellent company achieved the unimaginable: they enhanced it. It’s a big production with 24 actors and yet it feels wholly intimate. Director Bartlett Sher staged the play with an eloquent simplicity...What makes the adaptation so successful is the masterful finesse that turned the 60-year-old literary classic into a most poignant drama, still of its time, but also now very much of our time as well." Full Review

"Mr. Sher has made sure that every movement, every perfectly cast face, every stage picture and costume tells the story so precisely that it would do so even without words...Very effective; Mr. Sorkin apparently trusted that the actors, working with Mr. Sher, would fill in the blanks, and they do...It’s what happens in the gap between the old and new storytelling styles, as Mr. Sorkin tries to kill two mockingbirds with one stone, that gives me pause." Full Review

"The ever-likable Daniels, whose casting was genius, gives a strong and searching performance as Atticus Finch...The rest of the large and very fine cast perform their parts with all their hearts, under Sher’s impeccably fine-tuned direction...More faithful than not to its source...The designers have done a beautiful job of conjuring that era without smothering the narrative...This play belongs to Atticus Finch. He holds the stage and he wins our love." Full Review

"Any new dramatization of the iconic Lee novel calls for some drastic diddling with text.. Sorkin has managed to do so dynamically, without any disrespect to either the novel or the movie...Probably this production's most drastic, and to my surprise and delight, most effective change from previous dramatizations is the casting of adult actors to play the Finch children...Sher also draws terrific performances from other members of the large cast." Full Review

"While Sorkin’s script hews closely to the film in most respects, the changes he makes are mostly improvements...The level of the acting is superb; even small roles have been cast with fine actors...Although Atticus is still very much at the center, the play works more as an ensemble piece than a character study. Bartlett Sher directs the large cast with consummate skill. All in all, I was pleasantly surprised how well this stage version turned out." Full Review

"I had trouble adjusting at first to the southern accents, and also, the staging by Bartlett Sher seemed awfully busy flitting back and forth between the courtroom and other venues. But eventually I adjusted to that too. Putting Harper Lee’s long popular novel on stage was a challenge to Sorkin, given the narrative and character demands. But I am happy to report that his writing has succeeded admirably in capturing the essence of Lee’s work with strong dramatic impact." Full Review

"Genuinely radical and thoroughly gripping...Sorkin has written a 'Mockingbird' that fits this riven American moment. And the director, Bartlett Sher, has felt little need to assuage with sentimentality...Sher did not need to turn the character Bob Ewell into so broad a villain. But Sorkin did have to add agency to the African-American characters whom Lee gave little voice...This new version pulses with relevancy...It has the capacity to change how America sees this story for good." Full Review

"Sorkin has written a new play, and it’s characteristically taut and nimble, fluid and funny, with plenty to meditate on and argue about. Its goal is to speak audibly about 2018 and—sometimes poignantly, sometimes more heavy-handedly—it succeeds...Sher and his designers have created a shifting, breathing, gorgeously orchestrated world, and while the top-billed Daniels is indeed lighting up the stage as the story’s iconic lawyer, every member of the ensemble shines alongside him." Full Review

"It’s useful to have an actor of a certain gold-plated integrity like Daniels when you take on a piece as deeply embedded in the American consciousness as 'To Kill a Mockingbird'...To build a play in 2018 on these notions requires a writer like Sorkin who can toggle between the radically different mind-set of 1934, when the story takes place; 1960, when the novel was published; and today...Director Bartlett Sher has assembled a terrific cast." Full Review

"A gripping, deeply moving piece of theatre...The play begins with the trial...Dramatically, this gives the play a terrific sense of drive...This gracefully directed production has several neat conceits, one of which is to cast adults in the children’s roles...It could be confusing, but the performances are winning enough to carry it through...Sorkin’s vigorous version, arriving at a time when the US is at its most ethnically divided in decades, fully demonstrates why it is still a necessary ... Full Review

"I estimate that about 40% of the dialogue is Sorkin’s alone – and nearly 100% of it is riveting...Sorkin has occasionally replaced but more often has augmented what Lee and Foote had written...Sorkin’s adaptation, which doesn’t just cannibalize what his previous authors had written. Sorkin has occasionally replaced but more often has augmented what Lee and Foote had written. All those adapting should take Sorkin as their inspiration." Full Review

"The set-up is a Sorkin masterstroke, perfectly executed by director Bartlett Sher, a dreamy gambit that justifies every liberty this simultaneously revisionist and faithful 'Mockingbird' will take over the next two hours-plus...To my mind, only Frederick Weller’s evil Bob Ewell tosses the pitch too wide, and Sorkin deserves much of the blame there." Full Review

"Sorkin’s 'Mockingbird' is the most comprehensive study of the birds of Alabama — Finches, mockingbirds, all of them — you could hope to find. He’s picked new supporting characters from the novel to highlight, and even combined a couple...The pace is languid, for Sorkin. The old rat-tat-tat is missing, a good thing. He gets their cadences, and director Bartlett Sher lets everyone take their time telling the stories of Atticus, his kids, Tom Robinson and Boo Radley." Full Review

"While Lee’s vivid snapshot of the Great Depression-era Deep South is its own valuable time capsule, the shifting sands of race and justice in America is well served by at least some new perspective...Even with all its added Sorkinisms, there’s still something firmly classic about 'Mockingbird;' it’s essentially a white-savior story where the savior fails, as nobly as he can... A time-honored tale, skillfully told." Full Review