The Watering Hole NYC Reviews and Tickets
About the Show
Production Covid-19 Safety ProtocolsMember Reviews (15)
See it if art installations are theater for you. A guided tour through Signature's lobby, halls & auditoriums showing mixed quality unrelated art work
Don't see it if you expect plot, characters, or any other trappings of traditional theater. Some thought producing dramatic water related images. Some awful
See it if You want a full tour of Signature Theatre, including on stage, in what’s more or less a private experience (groups are capped at 4).
Don't see it if You don’t like poetic audio/video museum installations. That’s what this is — it’s absolutely not theatre, no matter what they say.
See it if You are looking for a piece where you can introspect and meditate. You enjoy works that speak to you directly as an audience member.
Don't see it if You are looking for a narrative piece of art. You enjoy visual arts and are looking for something closer to a gallery than the theatre. Read more
See it if You need to get out or want a grand tour of the Signature Theatre. An art installation aspiring to theatrical substance, it means well.
Don't see it if Expecting live actors or anything resembling plot, narrative or a line of action. Read more
See it if You need to get out of the house. You get to sit down most of the time so you can get a break from sitting on your own couch.
Don't see it if You want either theater OR an effective art installation. This is neither. I found it amateurish, forced and irritating. Read more
See it if you are very spiritual.
Don't see it if you are expecting to see theatre. The whole thing is very bizarre. I could truly not recommend this to anyone but happy to support the arts.
See it if you like to see the backstage and all of the different areas of the Signature Theatre. Fine for people who like immersive shows.
Don't see it if you are expecting a full-blown theatrical production. This was more like an exhibition where audience members interact with displays.
See it if This is an installation piece. There is not a live theatrical experience.
Don't see it if Very underwhelming, boring and pretentious. It really makes me angry thinking about this.
Critic Reviews (8)
"What I’d hoped for was refreshment. What I left with was a thirst for a more memorable and neatly composed offering...The production is too heterogeneous and muddled to rally around one clear theme or concept...Though well-intentioned, it’s hard to find the connective tissue here or, as Nottage says, the organizing principle. Whatever 'The Watering Hole' means to express, it’s drowned in this sea of artists."
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"In this haphazard array, there’s some lovely work, but unfortunately, some of it devolves past preciousness and into kindercore. Parts of the Signature look as though they’ve been turned over to a primary school. In one corridor, an artist has literally thumbtacked random water-related poems to a corkboard — I kept looking around for those construction paper Thanksgiving turkeys we all made by tracing our hands."
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"It turns out that 'The Watering Hole' not only refreshed me, but got me thinking about what theater is, or can be...There are no live actors, but there are many recorded voices and videos; audiences are small; masks are worn — but at least it gets us somewhere, into a gathering place with others who have come to share an experience."
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"Designed to give pandemic-weary audiences a psychological oasis and a spiritual tune-up, it has its striking moments...But these are not unalloyed pleasures: 'Freequency' is dominated by a run-on monologue, focused on the efficacious properties of creativity, that is so vaporous it all but floats away."
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"Not all of the installations are successful, and this 'Watering Hole' has its fair share of dry spots. Some of the experiences, for instance, push the new-age philosophizing a bit too far...In the wake of a pandemic that has made people wary of congregating and at a time when arts institutions are doubling down on their commitment to inclusiveness, this production demonstrates Signature's efforts to reboot and re-examine its responsibilities to theatre artists and the communities they represent."
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"I venture to say too many of the poetic feelings sought are not sufficiently realized. Too much of the contents are simplistic, clichéd, familiar while sometimes obscured. For instance, there’s a moment when patrons are asked to say their name so that their heart can hear it. Perhaps any individual person’s reaction to the entire enterprise might be extrapolated from that single request."
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"The totality of this event is provocative, playful and stimulating...In the wake of the pandemic and political unrest, The Watering Hole is a welcome and thoughtful communal diversion."
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“The Watering Hole,” an art installation that takes over nearly every nook and cranny of The Pershing Square Signature Center, is meant to be healing and calming…like water....the ten installations through which a masked guide leads us — each short piece riffing on the theme of water or theater or both — start to feel like part of a sacred ritual: Stations of the Muse?... A large group of talented artists have created some arresting lines, some vivid designs. On the whole, though, “The Watering Hole” turned out to be a depressing experience.
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