Tremor NYC Reviews and Tickets
Member Reviews (57)
See it if you want a plain Jane play that does not delve deep enough into the characters. Unemotional show about unfortunate incident.
Don't see it if If you want a play that could have been more. If you like a play that leaves you wanting. It is both confusing at times and very slow at oth
See it if you find it exciting to experience several turns of plot per hour.
Don't see it if frequent turns of plot make you seasick. Read more
See it if You like two person shows
Don't see it if You are not into very basic black box theater. There is no set and it’s just two actors talking to each other for 60 minutes Read more
See it if you like well written, talky shows that make you think.Acting is very good.Back story is slowly revealed.Has important things to say.
Don't see it if you want a straightforward play.This show is thought provoking, well acted, well structured.It's a play that gets under your skin.Relevant.
See it if You like 2 handers in which the subject matter is only revealed after a lot of dialogue. You are OK with no sets, it’s a bare stage.
Don't see it if You are looking for laughs. There is not a funny moment ! You don’t like plays that use heavily accented English. Lots of tense moments.
See it if you enjoy intense two-person drama with a slowly unraveling story which leaves you guessing about what actually happened until the end.
Don't see it if you only enjoy musicals, two-person drama with minimal staging (none) is not for you; you need a tidy plot line with no surprises.
See it if Estranged couple warily circling on a spare circular mat, wrestling with the aftermath of trauma, ultimately reacting in opposite directions
Don't see it if You have trouble with British accents You dislike a play that is largely an internal drama that unfolds through discourse rather than action
See it if you might like a 60-minute play that builds to slowly reveal about the characters and the reasons for encounter. The ending makes you think.
Don't see it if you prefer exposition to be revealed right away (takes some brain work to process play), you don't like intimate in-the-round seating
Critic Reviews (15)
The success of Birch's play depends on a series of carefully timed revelations...Mercatali's direction of this taut, brief two-hander builds successfully to a climactic speech...A wounding recollection of two lives caught up in a disaster that became a political flashpoint and tabloid fodder...A tale of making decisions with far-reaching consequences, and of traumas that continue to reverberate until the present day...Has much to say about the sour, pre-Brexit mood of Britain.”
Read more
“Starts off promisingly with an air of mystery and tension...Unfortunately...it lands with a thud at the end of a lot of lengthy speeches leading to faulty conclusions...Neither of the characters is developed much, not through the performances nor Mercatali's direction, which keeps them emotionally detached...It appears that the playwright wants to use the forum to talk about socio-political issues...He conflates too many separate ideas that do not support the play's conclusions.”
Read more
"Tremor is more of an actors' exercise than it is a play. The two-character work concerns Sophie and Tom who come together for the first time in years. They are two of seven who survived a bus accident which killed 32 and which may have been a terrorist act on the part of the bus-driver, who, we're eventually told, was 'Muslim.' Like so much else that transpires in this 60-minute dialogue by Brad Birch, it's an unresolved enigma."
Read more
“Birch’s intense, riveting drama...A simmering verbal confrontation that starts out strong and never looks back as the two-character play careens forward...A beautifully constructed back and forth that seems to never stop for air...Mercatali keeps the production’s brisk pace on track...The tension never lets up. You find yourself hanging on every word, engrossed in the dynamic of two fine actors and their absorbing characters."
Read more
"It’s tense and exhilarating, as directed neatly and with an increasing level of anxiety by David Mercatali...Starring two very capable and gifted actors, Lisa Diveney and Paul Rattray, who do a sexually charged dance around one another, scratching at the pain in their souls that is just itching under their skin...It’s a beautifully urgent and electrifying tango, frighteningly revolving around fear, judgement, punishment, and panic attacks."
Read more
"The head-scratching conclusion of this otherwise flavorful onion seems to belong to some other dramatic veggie…While the play's multiple issues may sound like playwriting overkill, Birch juggles them sufficiently well to hold our interest if not necessarily to convince us one way or the other about any of them…Rattray, a pleasant-looking guy with a rich Welsh accent, and Diveney, a pretty woman, are fully invested…regardless of the audience in the tiny venue being only inches away."
Read more
“All the makings of sparse British play with much cerebral potential...Although covering so much ground in such a short period of time borders on inundation, the play is so expertly written and the story so carefully unveiled that this potential excess is not too negatively felt...Diveney and Rattray tell the story with clear talent and skilled professionalism...Director David Mercalati effectively stages the actors...He expertly shaped the piece in line with the playwright’s intent."
Read more
"This gripping opening is ultimately squandered by a series of clumsy revelations and awkward sermonizing on contemporary politics, at which point the characters cease to be complex individuals and become stand-ins for competing ideologies...The dialogue is fast paced, full of stops and starts, which all works very well under David Mercatali’s tight direction, until the move away from mystery and tension and toward all-out exposition and speechifying."
Read more