"A stealth heartbreaker…By the end…you’ve discovered that this dribbling, homespun prose has shaped itself into patterns of profound poetry, as if words in invisible ink had been held up to a flame…The assumed Mancunian accents, which don’t come naturally to most of the cast, are initially off-putting. But by the end, every cast member has created a detailed and intimate portrait. And the final scene between Ms. McCann and Mr. Wilson is beautiful–and devastating.”
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"A long and busy family soap opera, chopped into 42 short parts, that toggles between banality and implausible melodrama. Fuzzily directed by Neil Pepe, the production suggests an acting class performing an anthology: 'Scenes for British Actors, Volume 8'...Its original London incarnation, perhaps, had some redeeming authenticity. At the Atlantic, it just seems beached."
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“Stephens endeavors to weave threads of existential wonder and terror into the fabric of a workaday family drama. But at times…the experience can feel a bit like reading a novel in which someone has underlined a passage and written ‘THEME’ in the margin…When the play waxes poetic, we can start to see it straining to affect us…The play is at its most moving when it feels the least need to explain itself.”
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"Neil Pepe’s production of this earlier work, about three generations of an English family coping with a tragedy that is only glancingly mentioned, is meticulous and the cast is flawless. But it’s not a top-drawer work, and it left me wondering–especially as I struggled through the thicket of impenetrable accents on display–what compelled the Atlantic to present it."
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"The British family...is made up of stock characters, each more boring than the next...Spending almost two and-a-half hours in their company is heavy going...The problem isn’t their modest dreams; it’s the absence of poetry or passion in their expression of those dreams...The hard-working actors are not to be blamed for the overwhelming blandness of the production...The heavy-handed production work dooms them to their dull characters and uninspired lines."
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“A slog to endure, at once dramatically overstuffed and curiously lifeless…The play’s staccato, episodic style proves off-putting…Some moments do resonate…But more often than not the short encounters seem to be over before anything interesting happens…Pepe accentuates the weaknesses of the writing with his somnolent pacing and visually drab production, often shrouded in darkness, lulling you into slumber. It’s a shame because the production features a lot of strong acting talent.”
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“An inert little production...Since we're unable to forge enough of a connection with these frigid characters to ever really invest in their well-being, it is difficult to care…The cast embodies these boring people with capable, competent performances across the board. Unfortunately, Stephens does them no favors by regularly having his characters speak the subtext…With everything that is happening in the wide world, the events (or lack thereof) in this play make it feel awfully insignificant."
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"There's a sad sense of ordinariness to 'On the Shore of the Wide World'...Subtlety done well can be wonderful, but 'On the Shore of the Wide World' meanders about for two long acts before reaching its unsatisfactory conclusion. It's only the fine work by director Neil Pepe's ensemble that stirs interest to see where it's going."
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