"This brave new 'Streetcar' takes a lot of risks, yet most of them pay off...Such an interpretation largely strips 'Streetcar' of its poetry. And there were certainly moments when I missed that poetry. But I was also willing to trade the delicate lyricism for genuinely original insights...This unusually dynamic 'Streetcar' plays more on our nervous system than with our hearts. But when Blanche finally goes down for the count, it’s impossible not to feel a choking rush of compassion."
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"There’s a fiery revival of Tennessee Williams’s great drama buried under the truckload of 1990s regietheater clichés that Benedict Andrews dumps all over...Andrews once more apes experimental staging tactics you find in productions from Thomas Ostermeier or Ivo van Hove—minus the intellectual or emotional engagement...Anderson’s Blanche and Ben Foster’s Stanley strike sparks, but they’re quenched under cold design and drafty, portentous pauses."
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"Everything in Andrews’s fascinating yet too-often-unaffecting interpretation aims big but in fact points toward smaller ways of understanding the play...The play is so phenomenally well written that there is much to gain from even an everted, objet d’art presentation like this one...Still, the production is too indulgent in sweeping away the implications of its choices, beginning with its stars."
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"Anderson's star turn in 'A Streetcar Named Desire' is a mixed bag. So is the revival of the 70-year-old drama...Her overripe posturing and fresh-from-the plantation drawl feel out of place in a production so contemporary that you could call it 'A Streetcar Named Ikea'...The impulse to ask audiences to pay attention and shift perspective on a well-known work is a good one by Benedict Andrews, even if it isn’t terribly enlightening."
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"Whatever the virtues and follies of director Benedict Andrews' self-consciously radical in-the-round regietheater staging, it gives us an incandescent Blanche...And in a production in which the actors' work is more consistently persuasive than the conceptual choices, it also gives us Ben Foster's distinctive Stanley Kowalski, a physically and psychologically considered characterization that sidesteps the long shadow of Marlon Brando."
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"If only this London import were better...Anderson and co-star Ben Foster have little to no erotic rapport. There’s a reason this play isn’t titled 'A Streetcar Named Class War'...As for Benedict Andrews’ production as a whole, it’s often maddening, and not in a good way...Pop music, a high-tech white set, Blanche’s Vuitton bag: The show displays all the signs of contemporary theatrical coolness. Yet there’s little gut underneath that hip surface."
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"Foster, who seems to have mixed Cross Fit with Häagen-Dazs in his prep for Stanley, unselfishly resists the charismatic impulses of the part, playing him more as a banal slob. And that allows the transcendence and meaning of Anderson’s performance as Blanche to dominate...Anderson’s Blanche DuBois is such a real creation...And the sonic thunder of applause that comes from the audience should leave her no doubt, now or ever again, that she can always rely on the kindness of strangers.”
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"It’s hard to endure the nonstop motion for 3½ hours. After a while, it comes off as an unnecessary gimmick...That aside, this is a great production. The play works unexpectedly well set in the present day and without the traditional Southern Gothic look...Anderson gives a wholly complete performance as Blanche that depicts the tragic character in all of her mental and emotional extremes."
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