See it if You appreciate a wrenching family story told with the drama and inventive staging of a play; though a solo show, it felt richly realized.
Don't see it if You need a linear story and a happy ending; you disbelieve accounts of abuse and its impact.
See it if Woman reconstructs her shattered identity after her mother’s death. Solo actress plays 3 generations with great feeling. Brilliant staging.
Don't see it if You aren’t interested in a painful, intense non-linear journey. A brutally honest view of the past sheds light on the present.
See it if Up for a raw, direct, intense & mesmerizing performance. A wonderfully unrelenting tale, you can't take eyes off Hope Salas.
Don't see it if You want to hum tunes on the way out; music here’s that of pure theatre, with a dead-on, direct, viscerally honest performance & script. Read more
See it if This was an amazing show. The acting was brilliant and moving. So many layers and details to the personal story. I was so glad to see this.
Don't see it if If you don't want to see serious and disturbing reality of a womans life. Not for those looking for light fare. This had disturbing twists.
See it if you enjoy creative, innovative dance theater work and interesting story-telling focusing on a women's journey of self discovery.
Don't see it if you are looking for a linear story telling style and are offended by profanity.
See it if you want to see a searing. precision performance about mourning and memory, involving parental abuse and alcoholism.
Don't see it if you do not like solo shows.
See it if you'd like a well preformed, beautifully staged, familial truth-telling session on the edges of trauma, addiction and dark humor.
Don't see it if you dislike heavy themes, performance art and one person story telling. Read more
See it if you like European-style theatre; for a strong autobiographical show that leaves you wanting more; to be inspired by a true artist.
Don't see it if you do not like solo shows; you need things wrapped up neatly at the end; you're not interested in a family drama. Read more
"Salas takes an intense, heart-wrenching story and infuses it with intrigue with an intense physical performance. Her background as a dancer is evident in her remarkably muscular arms which...glide smoothly across her body or perform rigid, modern dance-influenced gestures...Where most solo shows only scarcely employ props and technology, 'Hope' uses them to maximum effect, making for a fascinating and beautifully enhanced production.”
Read more
“Salas is contained in a very narrow body, but she is a powerful force on the stage...She has complete Martha Graham-like control...Salas gives us the complicated characters of her father...mother...a brave sex-worker...and she gives us her raw, honest self from childhood to now with all the beauty marks and other warts in various stages of healing...Salas can disappear so deeply into a character that we think someone else is in the room. It’s mind-blowing magic.”
Read more