Eve's Song NYC Reviews and Tickets
Member Reviews (42)
See it if If you want a show on racial issues and what people go through, family issues.
Don't see it if If you want a show that does not deal with racial issues.
See it if every pose of rectitude exploded w comedic ripostes; lesbian 1st love tender/sexy; strong performances by all leads; fine direct'n
Don't see it if play bites off too much: can't figure out if comedy that features intergenerat'l conflicts, or broad history of abuse of queer black women
See it if you'd like to see a sharply drawn piece for the era of #BlackLivesMatter that focuses on the women lost to needless violence.
Don't see it if you are looking for a straight drama: this 1 takes lots of liberties with the form. Read more
See it if This is a timely play depicting the stressors which affect a contemporary black family's lives; you like witty, dark comedy and good acting.
Don't see it if you're looking for a cohesive play that flows from scene to scene; too many topics make the play feel disconnected & unfocused; needs drama
See it if You want to see good actors try very hard to make a story work.
Don't see it if There was WAY too much going on here. It was exhausting trying to follow all the storylines.
See it if You are drawn to family dramas and/or plays that address social justice issues.
Don't see it if You want a fully baked production. You are resistant to race and sexual orientation as themes. Read more
See it if you like dark comedy about a black family trying to "fit" into white society and stay below the radar (with little success)
Don't see it if you dislike patronizing stories with pat characters that seem uncomfortable in their own skin
See it if An African American family drama which draws upon the tragic history of violence and prejudice in contemporary society. A strong ensemble.
Don't see it if Do not see if you are interested in light dramas or musicals.
Critic Reviews (20)
"Lloyd’s disconnected, macabre comedy...A smart, vivid concept still in search of full dramatic development. What it has to say about black lives in peril is genuinely terrifying, but mostly in the way that sobering statistics or news analyses are...It is as a lesbian identity story that ‘Eve’s Song’ works best. The show is never more winning or convincing than when we’re allowed to spend time in Lauren’s head as she sorts out just who she wants to be.”
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“The first half of ‘Eve’s Song’ plays as kooky dark comedy, but supernatural elements assert themselves with increasing frequency as the action progresses...Bonney guides the cast on a disquieting journey from humor to tragedy; newcomer Raquel is especially impressive as the sensitive Lauren...As plays about racial violence flood New York stages in an overdue cascade, Lloyd rises above the tide on the strength of her original voice."
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"It’s effortful and diffuse, with a forced, sitcomish sense of humor that dissolves into long stretches of maudlin faux-poetry. Director Jo Bonney is working hard but can barely keep the play knitted together, it’s such an undisciplined grab bag of varying tones, loose logic, and banal theatrical tropes...Meanwhile, it’s difficult to tell whether and where Lloyd and Bonney are aiming for parody."
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"It's a comedy — a very funny one...It'll also leave you shaken...Lloyd displays a luminous voice, at once uproarious and melancholy...Each performance has its own haunted quality...Not many people can weave a thread of humor into a play about violence against women in the African-American community, while making sure it also hits you hard in the stomach. Lloyd does both, and with the added attraction of making it feel like a credible ghost story...An exciting debut effort."
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“’Eve's Song’ offers a sharply drawn study of a middle-class black family under stress...’Eve's Song’ has many gripping passages, especially when the characters are baring their souls...but the playwright hasn't provided a central conflict...so it moves in an oddly stately fashion through a series of scenes that are more lie illustrations of an argument than the building blocks of drama...Thus, a play filled with menace and the threat of violence feels strangely becalmed.”
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“A riveting production about the plight of black women in America...’Eve's Song’, with its mix of satire, domestic drama, and elements of the supernatural, is both rooted in history and as current as today's headlines, a deft coming together of #blacklivesmatter and #metoo as told by a masterful storyteller...Much credit must go to director Jo Bonney, who manages to keep the intentionally disparate components of tone and style from clashing.”
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“Bonney directs with the right restraint, and the cast members respond to her. Aziza, Raquel, Green and Kelley hit the right levels throughout. For the Spirit Women roles, which call for adjuring restraint, Miller, Watson-Jih and Williams hit the right elevated notes...’Eve’s Song’ is a hard-hitting screed that arrives at a time when the Black Lives Matter movement has had to form due to daily intimations that black lives don’t particularly matter.”
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"Expressive as she is with words, Lloyd is not entirely in control of her narrative...Jo Bonney, the director, smoothly coordinates the text’s transitions between monologues and dialogue in conjunction with lighting designer Lap Chi Chu and set designer Riccardo Hernandez, who rearranges subtly iridescent walls for various locations. Their visual realization for the story’s grievous conclusion is apt. The play’s tricky shifts in tone are not so successfully managed, however."
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