A Bright New Boise NYC Reviews and Tickets
Show-Score Member Reviews (186)
See it if You enjoy engaging character study plays. A must see!
Don't see it if You don’t enjoy comedies and serious, relevant subject matter.
See it if you love a classic small cast drama--this is essentially what the theater is about. Extraordinary dialogue with an exceptional cast.
Don't see it if cannot handle dark themes about family and religion. Read more
See it if You can find apertures of light even in the darkest of life's moments. You appreciate poignant, masterfully penned scripts.
Don't see it if Your mind closes like a Skinnerian conditioned trigger when topics of religion or end times emerge.
See it if you like serious plays that involve perceptive analysis of troubled people in our society attempting to deal with their problems.
Don't see it if you favor "light" entertainment & happy endings rather than a deep and perceptive analysis of people in distress in our lower middle class.
See it if Samuel Hunter's insightful, nuanced, and frightening portrait of a fanatical evangelical who works for minimum wage at an Idaho Hobby Lobby
Don't see it if you are looking for light entertainment or don't like Samuel Hunter's work.
See it if you enjoy a funny but dark story of B'way caliber. It is one of the best plays of 2022/23 imho.
Don't see it if you want a happy ending.
See it if you like the tension of human relations among family members and work mates - here are damaged people coping with each other and religion.
Don't see it if you are looking for something light, though there are some funny moments amidst the difficulties with which they are dealing..
See it if You enjoy thought-provoking, compelling theater pieces with many themes and layers, with great performances.
Don't see it if You're not interested in current events or theological viewpoints.
Critic Reviews (17)
“It’s still a compelling play, worth seeing in itself and as a map of what would follow.”
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"4/5 Stars! Director Oliver Butler elicits discomfitingly authentic performances from the entire cast, led by the phenomenal Kendall...As the workplace comedy of the early scenes gradually yields to an unsettling exploration of family and faith, the play builds to a finale that verges on rapture."
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“Director Oliver Butler’s staging of Hunter’s breakthrough play is uniformly well-acted. It simmers with subtle unease...Even though the play doesn’t fully succeed, those dramatic hallmarks make it worthwhile.”
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“This is realism pitched to an unsettling extreme, a mundanity that starts to overwhelm us even before the play gets going.”
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“ ‘A Bright New Boise’ moves stealthily toward a bleak conclusion, but the observational clarity of Mr. Hunter’s writing never falters.”
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“In ‘A Bright New Boise,’ the seeds are planted, but its young writer hasn't really gotten there yet. But it's awfully fun to look back and see how far he's come.”
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“If the play's insights into working-class America put Hunter on the map, it also features a certain carelessness about plotting. Then again, Will's halting attempts at connecting with others is heartbreaking to see; the other characters are sharply, engagingly drawn; and there is the overpowering irony of this drama faith and identity playing out under the aegis of a business notorious for its religiosity and political meddling…Under Oliver Butler's direction, which doesn't miss a nuance, a fine cast brings Hunter's gallery of lost souls to strong, highly individual life.”
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“ ‘A Bright New Boise’ may not be his finest work, but visiting Hunter's Idaho always has its fair share of pleasures and revelations to make the trip worthwhile.”
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