Uncle Romeo Vanya Juliet NYC Reviews and Tickets
Show-Score Member Reviews (87)
See it if You like good theater and actors working hard
Don't see it if Do f see it if you don’t care for tedious plays
See it if you like classic plays but riffs on those classic plays
Don't see it if you're looking for a normal old play.
See it if You're a fan of theatre. This show takes risks and it all pays off.
Don't see it if You're not willing to see something completely different. If you go into this expecting a straight play, you won't enjoy it.
See it if you are a theater nerd. You love anything meta. You love old text in new contexts.
Don't see it if You are easily confused. You hated either Romeo and Juliet or uncle Vanya.
See it if You are fascinated by the parallels between these 2 classic plays and want to experience some top notch classical acting.
Don't see it if You are unfamiliar with these 2 plays or don't have a lot of patience to make the links.
See it if An often brilliant production of Uncle Vany often rudely interrupted by Juliet from R&J. Some gorgeous visuals on almost bare stage.
Don't see it if Not for people who love the classics as written. High levels of pretension that rarely help the story or the production.
See it if you love the text of R&J and Uncle Vanya because there are some really clever moments in this, you like experimental, absurdist theatre
Don't see it if you are looking for something traditional, IT'S LONNNNGGG, not into meshing two plays that don't really go together, not a fan of classics
See it if You are interested in the new perspectives that come from comparing and contrasting great works of romantic tragedy.
Don't see it if You are not already familiar with either play - especially Romeo & Juliet, as the interspersed scenes are tangential to primary plot line.
Critic Reviews (13)
"Chekhov takes up much of 'Uncle Romeo,' which is a blessing because as staged here, the parts from his play flow better than the ones from Shakespeare’s tragedy...Some of the juxtapositions have a humorous impact...Larger, structural changes are not entirely convincing...It’s relatively easy to follow the intertwined narrative strands — though it helps considerably to be familiar with both plays — but it’s hard not to wonder what the point is."
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"A crash-up of Chekhov and Shakespeare with an emphasis on the former: It's a vodka martini with the Bard as the vermouth. Unfortunately, this dramatic cocktail does little to bring out the shows' shared themes of passion, obsession and betrayal...Bedlam's M.O. is to crack open classic texts and discover something unexpected and resonant inside them. But beneath a few nifty performances, there's nothing at the center this time."
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“’Uncle Romeo Vanya Juliet’ begins casually and ends by breaking your heart...A riff on two plays at once, Shakespeare’s youthful romantic tragedy and Chekhov’s mature and moody comedy...The brilliance of Tucker and his company is to hold up a Shakespearean mirror to Chekhov in order to unleash his oft-hidden weirdness, wildness, and yearning. In these actors’ hands...certain scenes from ‘Uncle Vanya’ played more powerfully than I’ve seen in a long time.”
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"Mr. Tucker’s 'Uncle Romeo Vanya Juliet,' like even the most avant-garde of his shows, is both unpretentious and enormous fun...What Szadkowski does here is flat-out astonishing...Anyone who still questions the expressive potential of nontraditional casting should rush to see her. Everything about this show is a delight, but I bet it’s Ms. Szadkowski whom you’ll remember longest."
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"Whatever similarities Tucker saw in both these dramas, though, he has failed to communicate them in the mess of a production that has resulted...Even when the transitions from one play to another are smoothly done, Tucker's production never makes a convincing case for why these two works should be presented this way at all...God bless Bedlam for continuing to take risks with the theatrical canon, but this latest provocation is a misbegotten misstep."
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“Melding ‘Uncle Vanya’ and ‘Romeo and Juliet’ together requires taking the essence of the two pieces and superimposing them upon each other like interlocking puzzles. The ‘Vanya’ component, more or less, works within this structure. But ‘Romeo’ is almost absent in the process...Some ideas inevitably do not quite work out. There is no doubt, though, that Bedlam and Mr. Tucker will quickly rebound.”
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"In 'Uncle Romeo Vanya Juliet,' Tucker has tried something new: a mashup of both Chekhov's 'Uncle Vanya' and Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet,' with scenes from the two alternating. The result is not confusing, but irritating and irrelevant, with neither play gaining from the combination. The advertisement for this show reads '5 actors, 2 plays, 1 performance,' but to what point?"
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“Five doubling actors make their transitions with surprising ease and ingenuity. More importantly and to our delight, no character in either play is given short shrift...The ensemble does it all...We only have to sit back and marvel at how effortlessly we are being drawn into the co-existing dramas...This is neither a parody nor a patronizing view of these two great plays but rather invests a bit of wit and whimsy into each and into each an equal measure of pain and sorrow."
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