"Ms. Feiffer is a virtuoso in creating self-lacerating heroines. Her performance here is smart, brave and unsparing to the point that you wince at its lack of vanity. And in that excruciatingly well-acted opening scene, she has created a perfectly self-contained, socially resonant portrait...'Pain' is perfectly cast, beautifully acted, fluidly directed and astutely designed. But it ultimately collapses under the weight of heavy symbols and too literal-minded political correspondences."
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"Their dysfunction duet is peripatetic, nauseating, exciting. But the next two segments are not nearly as strong...The clumsiness of the play’s final hour is disappointing mainly because the restaurant scene is such a killer. In those first 30 minutes, director Trip Cullman has Feiffer and Linklater push their performances to the edge of nightmarish exaggeration while keeping their date horribly believable."
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"Feiffer is certainly stripping herself down both off and onstage...But her vulnerability, though it might have stemmed from personal awakening, doesn’t translate into a broader theatrical revelation. The play, for all its attempts at courageous self-exposure, feels sour and on-the-nose...Cat and Guy get a bit more dimension as the play progresses, but the aftertaste of 'Pain’s' first scene is lingering and bitter."
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"Despite excellent performances by Feiffer and her co-star Hamish Linklater, the play proves more punishing than enlightening...The characters and situations are defined so sketchily that the narrative twists feel annoyingly manipulative, despite the sleekness of director Trip Cullman's staging...Unfortunately, 'The Pain of My Belligerence' demonstrates that fearlessness isn't enough when it comes to art: You also need some finesse."
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"As portrayed by the hyperactive Linklater, Guy is obnoxious, arrogant, selfish, and more than a little hot...Feiffer delivers a performance that matches the brutal honesty of her writing...Cullman directs the play at a dizzying yet impressively coherent clip...But what made me most uncomfortable was the dark truth undergirding Feiffer's script — that we can be completely aware that something (or someone) is deleterious to our lives, yet keep coming back for more, almost like an addiction."
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"Whether or not Feiffer's play successfully addresses her stated intention may be a judgment call, but if the text could use a bit more focus in that direction, the playwright's sharp, intelligent dialogue always engages and intrigues. And the thick chemistry between Feiffer and Linklater in director Tripp Cullman's light and swift production allows the bulk of the piece to play like romantic comedy, providing an interesting contrast between tone and content."
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“If her best plays walk a tightrope between laughter and deep discomfort, ‘The Pain of My Belligerence’ tumbles over too often into the latter state, and not always convincingly...Cullman's handling of the actors is deft...Feiffer is one of our more consistently interesting playwrights, with a sense of humor that seems to have come through her patrilineal line...But ‘The Pain of My Belligerence’ is one of her lesser works. It's too much belligerence, and not enough pain.”
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"It's a brave effort, and I wish I liked it more. A look at bad relationships and the social structures that prop them up, it's marked by a) an unlikely and needless symmetry and b) containing virtually nonstop awful behavior by three of its characters...Feiffer, to her credit, isn't entirely blaming society for the sexual conventions that motivate women to place so much weight on male regard...Feiffer is valiant to explore it onstage, and in doing so brings along some pertinent observations."
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