Ride the Cyclone NYC Reviews and Tickets
Show-Score Member Reviews (210)
See it if a cross between The Breakfast Club and Final Destination 3 sounds intriguing to you. This was funny and different - I totally recommend it.
Don't see it if you have a strong fear of amusement park rides. Or amusement park fortune tellers. Or amusement parks in general.
See it if You like offbeat songs and storytelling imaginatively staged, performed by a vivacious young cast.
Don't see it if You dislike a theme park setting or slightly morbid themes.
See it if you want to see a fun, original musical with a talented cast.
Don't see it if you have a problem with young characters who are deceased.
See it if you're looking for something off the beaten path in a musical
Don't see it if you want a musical with a Serious Statement. Read more
See it if You like pop music type musicals, a bit left-of-center. Fresh, young and talented ensemble with very good voices.
Don't see it if You don't like your musicals a bit on the dark side with a tongue-in-cheek edge to it.
See it if You are up for a different kind of musical. This is a combination of teen age angst and macabre fantasy.
Don't see it if You think a revival of The Music Man is just your cup of tea.
See it if you like fun musicals. Nothing serious here. Just some very clever staging, good performances, terrific set, fun music.
Don't see it if you are looking for anything thought provoking. This is a terrific show for off Bway. Not enough "meat" to transfer. A lot of talented folks
See it if you like revue-style musicals, you aren't thrown off by completely different musical numbers, you enjoy a little absurdity and wackiness
Don't see it if you want to see a show that 'makes sense' immediately, you'd rather see something more serious
Critic Reviews (35)
"A weird little musical comedy about a horrific disaster...All of the performances are terrific, revealing both the cliché of their characters, as well as the genuine human beings underneath. And it’s charmingly pulled together by director and choreographer Rockwell, doing a fine service to the hilarious, inventive, and often surprising work of writers Maxwell and Richmond. It’s creepy, it’s campy, it’s touching, and, for a musical about a bunch of dead teenagers, it’s very funny. Take a ride."
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"An an unceasingly delightful new musical…It’s a witty, small-scaled show of immense sweetness and originality…All of the characters are drawn with sharp, funny detail…The director and choreographer, Rachel Rockwell brings variety and flair to all the musical sequences…’Ride the Cyclone’ achieves a rare unity in its book, music and lyrics...This oddball charmer radiates warmth and wit...If purgatory were really this much fun, I’d be happy to spend a lifetime there."
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"‘Ride the Cyclone’ seems awfully likely to make a major impact…It surprises with just how unusual, and unusually good, it is…The exquisite score ranges wildly, from a high-energy pop dance number that recalls Michael Jackson to a Marlene Dietrich-ish cabaret piece, and that’s just within the first few songs…Other than being simultaneously dark, funny, and poignantly life-affirming, the show stands out for how it privileges its characters’ inner lives."
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"A quirky, bizarre, creepy, clearly commercial, emotionally hefty and generally rather tantalizing musical…This staging is blisteringly good, sophisticated and detailed down to the very last moment…’Cyclone’ needs to live as a legit musical, and it is not yet fully there. But this thing sure is smartly written; it's rare in a new musical at this stage that the score is more of a problem than the book. And it is not that much of a problem at all."
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"'Ride the Cyclone' is a wild journey from start to finish, but its spectacle never eclipses the profound, unanswerable questions about the lives and deaths into which it delves…Subversive in its utter unwillingness to traffic in the sentimental, filled with a score of showstoppers, and featuring a crew of characters as instantly familiar and indelibly vivid as your immediate family, 'Ride the Cyclone' is a marvel."
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“If ever there were a ticket stub that should bear the words 'carpe diem,' the one for ‘Ride the Cyclone’ would be it. The brilliance of it all is that you careen toward that conclusion filled with every bit as much delight and wonder as a sense of doom…This musical — with a brilliant genre-hopping pastiche score full of ingenious lyrics — has been hauntingly directed…Every element of the show’s design is magical…An emotional thrill ride of a musical that every adult will savor."
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"This delightful Canadian chamber musical is far funnier, and more moving, than it sounds…All right, the concept is a little out there, but taken as read, it’s wackily, marvelously executed…Rockwell’s staging is deliciously fresh and inventive…And the spot-on cast makes everything of their material…As irreverent as it is accomplished, ‘Ride the Cyclone’ does the job of any good amusement-park attraction: It makes you consider your mortality, but leaves you grinning ear to ear."
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"A part comedy, part tragedy that takes us away from reality for 90 spellbinding minutes…What makes the show work? First of all, it is in the hands of the award-winning director/choreographer Rachel Rockwell...Her creativity is unique and fitting for a show featuring music from almost every genre…This is the start of something that could become a new cult show and we may see this show around for many years. This is unique storytelling and a story that is worth telling."
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