"Dynamically performed, well conceived and theatrically accomplished, it’s an intense though often humorous presentation...Darney has skillfully fashioned an engaging, unflinching character study. There’s no plot but it is still a compelling take on this phenomenon...Arresting tableaus and dance sequences visualize sexual activities and the dialogue portions have momentum...Like its subject matter, '5 Guys’ becomes numbing due to the relentless and repetitive actions enacted."
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"A cross between documentary theatre and performance piece...At two points the guys come together in a transcendent erotic dance...These moments—a highlight of the show—provide a glimpse into what this piece could become were it not hampered by a devotion to the literal...This is really two plays in one...These two stories don’t mesh well, and the conflict persists throughout...All five actors give passionate performances, and do much to make the dialogue fit as well as it can."
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"This is an easy, free-flowing evening of sex and drug talk, but underneath, this confessional play is something more disturbing and fraught....To varying degrees, these five actors do a great job bringing us in and connecting us to their struggles and pain...The stories being told in writer/director Peter Darney’s '5 Guys' sometimes have an awkwardness in the scenario but a realness in the telling...This play does a great job in showing us both the highs and the lows."
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"Darney’s evident intent is to have you react to '5 Guys' as both an entertainment and as a powerful—and graphic—cautionary tale. The combination can feel awkward at times, and unrealistic. At first blush, it might seem odd that the characters spend much more of their time talking about past practices and experiences rather than, um, making new ones...The knowledge that everything the characters say is verbatim from actual people adds an extra layer of alarm and revulsion."
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"'5 Guys Chillin'' is a new, original, refreshing play that is a conversation starter...My eyes were certainly opened watching this show. I was shown a segment of the gay community I had only heard about, but never experienced...As the show went on, the stories intensified, each becoming more jaw-dropping than the one before...I really commend Peter for bringing this subject to the forefront. He has written a terrific, eye-opening play that is not easy to watch, but really should be seen."
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"There’s a delicate balance to be struck between the veracity of the interviews and the dramatic action of the play. ‘5 Guys’ manages to achieve this balance with integrity…There is a slightly creeping sense of exposition which in a way can’t be helped…Their fictional characters are carefully and skillfully developed…In all, ’5 Guys ’ is a contemporary and crucial production. It’s well-crafted, convincingly performed and with a notable commitment to the genre of verbatim theatre."
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"While its verbatim script and loose structure prevents ’5 Guys’ from becoming an entirely coherent piece of theatre–the characters are inconsistent and the episodes don't cohere into a dramatic narrative–it achieves its polemical aim as a warning against casual sex and drugs…By the finale, the production has made its point…It is as shocking as a government-funded advert from the 1980s, with a tombstone casting a shadow over the cheeky, fun-seeking characters."
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"A verbatim ensemble work that is both didactic and entertaining…After a while, among all the frivolity and sexual mimicry, the play becomes something of a predictable checklist of issues in which every box has to be ticked…It is an insight into an often dark world, where for many sex has overtaken their lives…For all of them, it provokes issues that need to be confronted not just by them but by society as a whole, and this play brutally brings those into the public domain."
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