Last Man Club NYC Reviews and Tickets

77%

(39 Ratings)

Positive

79%

Mixed

21%

Negative

Members say

Great acting, Absorbing, Slow, Confusing, Great staging

About the Show

Axis Company presents a return engagement of "Last Man Club," a one-act drama set during the Dust Bowl, an era of environmental and economic strife catalyzed by unrestrained human greed.

From 1930-1939, the Great American Desert of the Texas and Oklahoma plains—destroyed by the expansion of wheat farming, which plowed beneath the bluestem and buffalo grass holding the dirt in place—blew up into the air in dust storms that packed enough static electricity to power the city of New York. Many refused to leave their dust-covered farms, even after all the animals died and they were eating bitter roots to survive. "Last Man Club" is about one of the families who stayed. With no one else around for a hundred miles, Major's family lives in a one room dugout as he tries to reconcile himself to the fact that his own kin has taken the money and run. Out of the biggest storm in the history of the Dust Bowl—200 miles wide, 15,000 feet high—come two desperate men promising a way out.

Show-Score Member Reviews (39)

Riveting, Great acting, Dizzying

See it if you enjoy Beckett-esque thrillers, you like great design elements, you don’t mind creepy.

Don't see it if you want a musical, you want easy answers, you don’t like dust.

Depressing, Riveting, Brilliant

See it if you want to experience what Dorothea Lange and Walker Evans photographed for the WPA.

Don't see it if you cannot deal with profoundly depressing circumstances that are all too real. Read more

American, Elemental, Mythic, Intriguing

See it if you want to experience a stark tale from the Dust Bowl days of the American Southwest in the Depression years, dramatized with mythic power.

Don't see it if you are looking for a mainstream Western. Read more

Mysterious but captivating

See it if you want a taste of real hardships endured during the Depression Dustbowl, complete w broken families, con men, hunger, dust & thirst.

Don't see it if you mind ambiguity, strange characters or an imperfect plot. Read more

A dark moody atmospheric piece about what happens when the weather goes crazy. sound familiar?, Intense, Great staging, Edgy, Absorbing

See it if You ever wondered what it felt like to be trapped in the Dustbowl of the 1930's, this will take you there with genuine power of Nature punch

Don't see it if Something chillingly suggestive of our present climate crisis is the last thing you want to be reminded of, you might want to hide your eyes

Resonant, Great writing, Ambitious, Absorbing

See it if Well conceived and executed tale of life during the dust bowl. Not your typical view, quite lyrical and evocative.

Don't see it if you aren't open to an unconventioanal view of a familiar theme. The writer/director had a concept, the actors bought in to it, and it shows.

Resonant, Intelligent, Thought-provoking, Great staging, Great acting

See it if you want to be immersed into the 1930's Dust Bowl: people, sights, dress, sounds and smells. Production brings the era alive in a good story

Don't see it if you want a happy story or grand production: this set and actors recreate a haunting time. Difficulty understanding some conversations.

Great acting, Entertaining, Clever

See it if It's great theatre in a small room. Staging/effects/costumes really helped add to the setting. Acting was great!

Don't see it if They use some smoke-like stuff to add to the effects of the dust bow and it got a little stuffy/hard to breathe at one point.

Critic Reviews (4)

“’Last Man Club’ beautifully overloads the senses and transports you to the Dust Bowl in the 1930s...’Last Man Club’ is not a play which tells a straightforward story...This experience is best described as immersive environmental theater...The atmosphere is suffocating and riveting...The six actors combine a naturalistic style with their unique character's individualized quirkiness...This is a theater piece to experience not simply to follow a story arc.”
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“Earth, air, water, and fire -- every vital element reaches critical risk level in ‘Last Man Club’, a tense dystopian mood piece from writer/director Randy Sharp...This one-act historical drama blows in with gale force as Sharp and her creative team unearth the allure and agony of Depression-era manifest destiny compounded by an environmental crisis...The compelling paradox...is that it succeeds as a technically clean production while vividly presenting such a depressing dilemma.”
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“An immersive revisit to a prior end of times...A journey into seeming end-of days as outside forces overwhelm both body and soul...The play is many things all at the same time, but mainly a full meal of a theatrical experience that has a depth that only an ensemble group like Axis can bring to it...The actors and the directing are all spot-on bringing their talents to bear, blending the darkness of life with the only thing that keeps us alive, that spark of hope, whether real or imagined.”
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"Axis Theatre, the bold standard of boundary-breaking Off-Broadway theatre, once again serves up a powder keg banquet of characters...The script, direction, design, and actors elevate it to something as raw as it is wistful, wrapped in humor and drama...This is not a neat and tidy play with its curdling undertones of a distant time and place, but it is fleshed out with stark and haunting performances...A show that defies cliché in favor of the stirring and thought provoking."
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Trailer

Creative team