Rock of Ages NYC Reviews and Tickets

Review: ‘Rock of Ages’ Returns, Scaled Down but Big Hair Intact In a limited run Off Broadway, the jukebox musical about love and rocking out in the 1980s now includes songs by Def Leppard.
Read more

Rock of Ages Still Rocks The classic rock jukebox musical returns to New York for its 10th anniversary.
Read more

★★★ A decade after its first air guitar riff, the hair-metal jukebox musical is back—and it’s still nothin’ but a good time
Read more

"You go to 'Rock of Ages' for its music, not its plots…or its string of incessantly raunchy juvenilia…The music, though, if it's up your alley, certainly shivers the timbres [sic!] with a succession of vocally explosive and physically dynamic performances."
Read more

“A seriously silly, absurdly enjoyable arena-rock musical...Written with winky wit...directed with zest...sung with scorching heat by a spirited cast, and featuring a towering stack of heavy-rotation favorites from the glory years of MTV— this karaoke comedy about warped-vinyl dreams is about as guilty as pleasures get...’Rock of Ages’ does not aspire to be a Broadway musical for the ages, but for anyone whose youth coincided with the time period...the siren call...may be impossible to resist.”
Read more

“’Rock of Ages’ is a mangled singing, dancing extravaganza...’Rock of Ages’ is too full of self-conscious winks, nudges, and wine-cooler jokes to be much fun. There’s energy onstage, all right, but it’s unfocused and muddled. The dancers wriggle about in epaulette-shouldered leather jackets and neon animal-print Spandex, trying to conjure the big-haired ghosts of a lost era. They only end up looking cheap and desperate. This is no way to get your rocks off.”
Read more

“A Broadway musical that masquerades as an ’80s cover-band concert...With its glaring lack of wit and sophistication, D’Arienzo’s book might well have been cribbed from an episode of ‘Saved by the Bell’...For Gen Xers on a nostalgia trip, though, this Off Broadway transfer does provide its Memorex-induced pleasures...Is ‘Rock of Ages’ nothin’ but a good time? Not quite. But it’s frequently more fun than it has any right to be.”
Read more

“This unapologetically silly hair-metal jukebox musical will probably have you gulping tequila shots and singing along...A purpose-built, featherweight plot, the show has an abiding affection for its inglorious era that goes some way toward selling its brash charms...Hanggi knows better than to loiter long between songs, and while it’s overstretched for a show that waves its lack of substance like a banner, 'Rock of Ages' keeps moving.”
Read more

“I enjoyed quite a lot of ‘Rock of Ages’; even though the songs don't carry the same nostalgic appeal for me as it does for its target audience...It would have been better off as a ninety-minute intermission less show, as the production really starts losing steam early in Act II, but much of it is good, stupid, noisy fun that doesn't take itself as anything more than good, stupid, noisy fun...It's spirited, well-intentioned rocker fluff. And if that's your kinda show, you'll probably have a blast.”
Read more

“’Rock of Ages’ never pretends to be anything it isn't...And it's that confident individuality that makes it the smartest dumb show in town...’Rock of Ages’ isn't trying to be theatre the way ‘Mamma Mia!’ and ‘Jersey Boys’ are. It's just trying to be a good time. And with its just-barely-there book by D'Arienzo and spine-throbbing songs...It succeeds in spite of itself...’Rock of Ages’ does everything wrong, but still ends up being unquestionably right.”
Read more

“There is a flimsy plot about a rock club under threat from a greedy developer, but D'Arienzo's book is essentially a series of winking setups for songs by the likes of Bon Jovi, Journey, Poison, Whitesnake and Twisted Sister...The guilty pleasures offered by the music are diminished by the irritatingly self-conscious, irony-drenched presentation...Inexplicably, ‘Rock of Ages’ plods on for 2½ hours...You're better off buying an '80s hits collection.”
Read more