Women of a Certain Age: Election Year in the Life of One Family, Play Three NYC Reviews and Tickets
About the Show
Tony Award-winning playwright and director Richard Nelson returns to the Public Theater with the final chapter his new three-play cycle about the Gabriels of Rhinebeck, New York.
Show-Score Member Reviews (73)
See it if you've seen the other two plays in the Gabriel Family cycle, enjoy understated but terrific acting, like literate takes on current issues
Don't see it if a family's quiet but interesting conversations would bore you, you don't like slice of life realism, don't want to reflect on modern issues
See it if You appreciate nuanced theater that helps you understand people better
Don't see it if You like a lot of action or a clear resolution.
See it if you want an intimate look at a family with timely economic, social, political issues told in a slow pace with quiet, realistic dialogue
Don't see it if you want an action play or a cheery one; you want no mention of politics (but with its great characters this is mostly about a family coping Read more
See it if you love feeling like a fly on the wall.
Don't see it if you need a show with a traditional plot.
See it if you like a simple story, beautifully acted, leaving you with much "food for thought"
Don't see it if you haven't seen the two prior pieces. See them first
See it if you enjoy small plays that are about big things. I like the quiet profundity of Richard Nelson's writing. The cast to a one is superb!
Don't see it if don't like plays where there's not much action. This is people talking in a kitchen. But if you are game to listen, you'll be moved.
See it if You like political, intelligent plays. See it for the first-rate acting.
Don't see it if You do not like political plays that are left-leaning (😉).
See it if Want to spend another rich, satisfying, poignant, yet often humorous evening with the Gabriels and you like great writing and acting.
Don't see it if You don't like quiet plays to which you have to listen and pay attention.
Critic Reviews (23)
"'Women of a Certain Age' is highly relevant in today’s day and age…For the first time in the Gabriel plays, Nelson’s writing shows an elegance as real issues are discussed. Healthcare, jobs, education, gender, gentrification and lack of income weave their way into the conversation. The cast is all sublime and so real."
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"Playwright/director Richard Nelson ends his masterly trilogy, 'The Gabriels: Election Year in the Life of One Family,' with 'Women of a Certain Age'...Nelson’s writing is skillful, insightful and steeped in heightened reality...The family—or, rather, the cast—is exceptional...Plunkett makes Mary so real and her problems so immediate that the actor and character seem the heart of 'The Gabriels'...The plays are not to be missed."
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"Their conversation ranges far and wide, from vintage cookbooks to gentrification to outside money’s influence on local politics...The Gabriels do not yet know the election results, but their future does not look bright regardless of the outcome...Anyone who has not seen at least the middle play of the trilogy may not get a lot out of this one. The ensemble cast is outstanding."
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“The company that has been with the plays all year remains the rare ensemble with no membrane between performance and what feels like intimate reality...Nelson’s goal, as expressed in the program, was to 'portray a world where the personal, the cultural, the societal, the familial, the artistic, the political are viewed not as separate categories, but as dependent aspects of each of our lives.' He does all that, and more."
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"You feel for the Gabriels – the play is notably well-acted – but their rather passive reaction to their woes is a bit annoying...All three plays, directed by Nelson, follow the same narrow path. They’re similarly staged, with the family chatting as they sit around the kitchen table preparing a meal, and all chart an unrelieved downward course. Maybe they’re a more fitting dramatic counterpart to the election than Nelson suspected they’d be."
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"'The Gabriels' is everything the next president is not: thoughtful, meditative, hesitant, self-critical and, above all else, quiet. Nelson and his inspired cast have turned the story of one beleaguered family into an arresting parable of decline in educated middle-class America...Nelson’s work seems more vital than ever. And yet this kind of political theatre is preaching to the converted. What difference can it make?"
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"Leave it to Richard Nelson to write so elegantly about the most inelegant era in our country’s recent history...It all seems simple, even simplistic, in summary, but Nelson’s exquisitely detailed writing—his often funny and pointed dialogue takes mundanity to new heights of poetic realism—and deft directing are joined by the flawless performances to make this intimate but expansive play help in the healing that our divided nation will be needing."
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