Privacy

“Viewed as a play, it is neither as profound as it aspires to be nor even entirely cohesive. But it ingeniously recreates that most venerable of entertainments, the magic show, in a form ideally suited to the second decade of the 21st century...I’m making ‘Privacy’ sound creepier and more compelling than it ultimately is...The parts of the show I can’t talk about—the many audience participation sequences—are both its giddiest and most sobering." Full Review

“Graham and Rourke's willingness to play with form to memorably convey content is enhanced by a cast that is more than game: Radcliffe embodies a character that is relatable and specific in his insecurities...Our desire for privacy has come in direct conflict with our narcissism. As Graham brutally shows, the latter seems to be winning at the moment.” Full Review

"A cleverly done half-play, half-public service announcement…Daniel Radcliffe gives an extremely likable and empathetic performance as an introverted everyperson writer…The first half of the evening playfully demonstrates the multitude of ways our virtual identities are formed…But by the time Snowden appears describing a near future of lives being forcibly lived without secrets, we've been schooled in the multitude of ways our virtual identities can be used." Full Review

"A mind-bending theatrical experience...Daniel Radcliffe, who’s made auspicious Broadway appearances, is enormously appealing as The Writer in this confounding play...Dratch is especially persuasive as the M.I.T. professor Sherry Turkle...Over the course of this ever-surprising play, the Writer keeps learning how the Internet overrides what he thinks of as free will...But in the end, he can’t answer the big question: Who owns your life?” Full Review

“A sardonic but disturbing survey of data mining and surveillance...The piece is a fresh and engaging mélange of verbatim interview text, geektastic research and romantic comedy...Radcliffe is more assured and funnier than ever, a bemused Everyman learning how to open up without losing his sense of identity. The supporting actors are marvelous.” Full Review

“The play is ultimately more informational than successfully dramatic, often having the feel of an intricate, celebrity-studded TED Talk. But it nonetheless emerges as a dazzlingly inventive and entertaining theatrical exercise...Director Rourke keeps the production's complex technological balls up in the air with consummate skill, and the performers superbly rise to their many challenges. Radcliffe employs his natural charisma and likability to excellent effect.” Full Review

“So specifically and solely a discussion of privacy in the age of smart phones that it barely functions as anything else...The saving grace of this production (directed wittily by Rourke) is that it remains entertaining even when merely massaging information most of us absorbed years ago...Tech tricks lend it an atmosphere of surprise that its content sorely lacks, and also a sense of urgency that it cannot otherwise gin up...Like a lot of documentary theater, its point-of-view is too diffuse.” Full Review

“If this sounds more like a TED talk than conventional theater, the impression is reinforced by there being little plot to speak of (or worth speaking of. There is a bullying director and a therapist and a long-lost love, all of it fairly perfunctory.) Still, the creative team works hard to keep us engaged, not just with the interactivity, but with Duncan McLean’s artful and useful projection design, and a kind of trickster theatricality.” Full Review

“Really an excuse for a combination debate on issues of privacy and demonstration of tech wizardry...The proceedings are more fun than frightening, even when things turn somewhat sinister as the information gathered from the audience gets twisted into anti-government evidence...‘Privacy’ raises numerous important issues about our media-crazed, totally public world but addresses them with parlor tricks rather than serious thought.” Full Review

"Not so much a play as a documentary filtered through a series of comic sketches...The result is undeniably entertaining, often uproariously funny...Gifted with a sharp sense of humor, a gamely engaging star, a talented supporting cast, and light-fingered, fast-paced direction by Josie Rourke, 'Privacy' is undoubtedly going to entertain a great many people. Whether it will enlighten them is another matter...And, at two and a half hours, 'Privacy' makes its points exhaustively, and exhaustingly." Full Review

"'Privacy' could easily have been a lecture on the fact that there is no such thing anymore. That, however, while interesting, would not have reached in and touched us between the ears. Graham and Rourke have created what we used to call 'A Happening'…The twists and turns of this production–and the cast is superb in every way–catch us off-guard and profoundly shift our perception of our relationships to all the electronics to which we are devoted." Full Review

“Starring Daniel Radcliffe, whose considerable talents are squandered in a production that’s long on information, but short on dramatic tension. Radcliffe plays a depressed writer searching for his authentic self. But in the digital world, does one actually exist?...Co-created by Josie Rourke and James Graham, the slick, fast-paced show is aided by Duncan McLean’s projection design and audience participation.” Full Review

"A freewheeling, overstuffed adventure saga where the lone individual confronts the wonders and terrors of current phone and computer technology...Whereas Radcliffe has taken on some very challenging roles on Broadway in recent years, his function here is far more passive...but he does show off his considerable comic abilities...‘Privacy’ is all over the place, but it makes its points about the utter lack of personal privacy in today’s day and age with clarity as well as shock value." Full Review

“Whether it’s cameras monitoring our every move, online gizmos constantly gathering data, everyone is always connected and sharing— whether they want to or not. That’s pretty much the point...Most telling is when the audience gets walked through the 'privacy' button on their phones, which actually double as tracking devices...Judging by 'oohs' from me and my fellow audience members - that’s when ‘Privacy’ gets eye-opening.” Full Review

“Radcliffe is the only cast member who plays just one role. He's a charmer, even though his character is an emotional basket case...Fast-paced, fun and provocative as all this is, the dating aspects of the production tend to come off as somewhat forced. Ultimately this is an overly ambitious attempt to tackle a big fat bundle of Internet-related problems. The jokey business used to tease the audience into more serious-minded reflection, somehow doesn't work as well as it should.” Full Review

“This review of the brave and talented Daniel Radcliffe starring in James Graham’s new play will be about as vague as can be, while still telling you about this funny and deeply disturbing look at our world...Fantastically directed by Josie Rourke...The cast is smart, funny, and totally on-point as they each inhabit numerous real and imaginary characters...Every one of these actors are a joy to behold.” Full Review

“The riveting unconventional comedy - part metadata high-tech primer, part futuristic horror show about the present, part audience participation event with the spirit of a hip magic show - made me more paranoid than I already am about the intimate reach of the digital revolution...Ultimately, the play’s end feels inconclusive. But given the seismic ongoing transformation of our idea of privacy, a tidy ending would have seemed false.” Full Review

“‘Privacy’ is entertaining, educational – and frightening. You probably were aware of the information gathering on the Internet and smart phones but you have never seen it demonstrated to this extent. The use of information gathered from the audience causes a great deal of laughter but by the end it is no laughing matter: identity theft and other criminal uses are fully explored. At the end of the evening, you may be inspired to never want to use your smart phone again.” Full Review

“Watching ‘Privacy’ is not unlike being on a cruise ship where the nightly entertainment alternates between mentalists and hypnotists…‘Privacy’ is a play that is conceived more than it is written. In the Playbill, Graham’s author credit is below the credit 'created by James Graham & Josie Rourke,' which is as it should be. Rourke also directs...In the excellent cast, Rachel Dratch and Reg Rogers are especially effective.” Full Review

"Although there’s a wisp of a plot...'Privacy' isn’t a play. It’s sort of a dramatized, semi-documentary, presentation/lecture, with audience participation and some laughs...Radcliffe reveals an appealingly quick wit in the ad-libbing that’s a substantial part of the evening. Aside from its helter-skelter progression, the biggest problem for 'Privacy' is that it urgently tells us something we already know, or suspect." Full Review

“How fascinating you will find ‘Privacy’ - which I felt was sometimes engaging and largely tedious over its two-and-a-half hours - will depend on how little you knew before about how invasive technology can be, how dazzled you are by Rourke’s admittedly inventive staging, and how delighted you are just to be in the room with its star, Daniel Radcliffe...Graham’s germ of a story is, indeed, a good one, so it’s a shame he basically abandons any form of conventional dramatic storytelling.” Full Review

“A disquieting comic-thriller...Radcliffe offers another in a line of effacing and affecting performances…Agreeable supporting performances are turned in by a cast in multiple roles...I’m not sure any of the revelations come as a jarring surprise, though they raise substantive issues in myriad original ways.” Full Review

"Radcliffe is totally charming. Meanwhile, under Josie Rourke's inventive staging, old hands like Michael Countryman, Rachel Dratch and Reg Rogers deftly whirl though characters and accents faster than you can say WikiLeaks...Still, I couldn't shake the feeling that I was in a Media Studies class taught by a professor more eager to make his students like him than to teach them anything new...The show doesn't really have anything more to say than you've already known for a longtime." Full Review

“Radcliffe turns in a fine performance, but the contrived plot is peripheral to the message…Writer James Graham collaborated with Josie Rourke on the multi-media production which comes off as an interactive tutorial in which audience members are encouraged to use their phones and the versatile cast gets to flex their improvisational muscles. More than a play, ‘Privacy’ is a cautionary tale, a most entertaining one that is as disturbing as it is enlightening.” Full Review

"The point is to illustrate Edward Snowden’s critique of government surveillance and the whistleblower himself duly pops up in a video recording…'Privacy’s' hypothetical denouement turns out to be so far-fetched that I felt less convinced by Snowden’s case at the end of the play than I had been beforehand…Documentary theatre works best when grounded in hard facts. By resorting to overheated speculation, Graham weakens the argument at the heart of his play." Full Review