Review Roundup: PLACEBO Opens Off-Broadway

Playwrights Horizons presents the world premiere of PLACEBO, a new play by Obie Award winner Melissa James Gibson (This at PH, What Rhymes with America, Suitcase, [sic], the FX series "The Americans," "House of Cards" on Netflix). Directed by three-time Obie Award winner Daniel Aukin (This at PH, The Fortress of Solitude, Bad Jews, 4000 Miles, [sic]), the play is the fourth production of the theater company's 2014/2015 Season. Opening Night set for tonight, March 16 at Playwrights Horizons' Mainstage Theater (416 West 42nd Street).

The cast of PLACEBO features Tony Award nominee and Theatre World Award winner Carrie Coon (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Gone Girl, Nora Durst in the HBO series "The Leftovers"), William Jackson Harper (A Cool Dip in the Barren Saharan Crick at PH; All the Way, Ruined, Modern Terrorism), Alex Hurt (Scenes from a Marriage, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Unrequited) and Florencia Lozano (Red Dog Howls, Macbeth, Privilege).

A minty green pill - medication or sugar? Louise (Coon) is working on a placebo-controlled study of a new female arousal drug. As her work in the lab navigates the blurry lines between perception and deception, more and more these same questions pertain to her life at home. With uncanny insight and unparalleled wit, Melissa James Gibson's affectionate comedy examines slippery truths and the power of crossed fingers.

Let's see what the critics had to say...

Charles Isherwood, The New York Times: The persistence of feelings of inadequacy is a subterranean theme in the play, the latest from the gifted writer of "This," seen at the same theater...Ms. Gibson has a lovely affinity for parchment-dry humor that softens the sadder undercurrents of "Placebo." And she imbues her characters with an affection for wordplay and the oddities of language...Like Will Eno, Ms. Gibson puts amusingly off-kilter, slightly stylized exchanges in the mouths of her everyday characters with convincing grace. The laughs provide a helpful binding agent, because in some respects Ms. Gibson hasn't managed to cohesively weave together the two strands of the play...The director Daniel Aukin, Ms. Gibson's longtime collaborator, keeps the zigzagging between the story lines smooth...Ms. Coon and Mr. Harper are also excellent. Ms. Coon...brings a touching, forlorn quality to her performance...Jonathan is the play's trickiest role...Happily, Mr. Harper displays a brooding interiority that makes it seem natural that Jonathan would close in upon himself when his insecurities become too much to bear.

David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter: A doctoral candidate's involvement in a double-blind study for an experimental drug designed to awaken the dormant female libido becomes a mirror for the shortcomings of her own relationship in Placebo. Or at least that's what Melissa James Gibson's elusive play about desire, intimacy and the challenges of sustaining emotional and sexual connections seems to be getting at. The overlap between the protagonist's work and home life is writ large in the design of Daniel Aukin's nicely acted production, with a fine cast of four led by emerging talent Carrie Coon. But the two worlds are never satisfyingly braided together in the playwright's unresolved text.

Marilyn Stasio, Variety: Off Broadway's Playwrights Horizons is justifiably celebrated for its impressive 44-year record of supporting American playwrights. So it's awkward to be heaping praise on the sterling work of director Daniel Aukin and the four terrific performers -- Carrie Coon ("Gone Girl," "The Leftovers"), William Jackson Harper, Alex Hurt, and Florencia Lozano -- in Melissa James Gibson's "Placebo," without finding much merit in the work itself. But that's as it must be, because whatever the scribe ("House of Cards," "The Americans") was going for in this relationship play, the message didn't land...Director Aukin...has an uncanny feel for the quirky nature of the scribe's droll dialogue, which he has imparted to his smart and extremely personable cast. As for the radiant Coons...idiosyncratic language and witty word games are her stock in trade. She's also unafraid, in those comic exchanges with the two very different men in her life, to explore those unspoken fears hiding under the skin of a joke. But she can't pull a meaningful play out of a sensitive character study.

Frank Scheck, New York Post: A placebo is medical-speak for a harmless substance that has no real curative effects whatsoever. The same could be said of Obie winner Melissa James Gibson's new drama: "Placebo" which looks and feels like a play but lacks any real impact...The connection between Louise's work and her unsatisfying personal life seems tenuous at best, and some plot turns - including a "breather" the couple takes, during which time they both stray - aren't really developed. That wouldn't matter if the characters or dialogue were more compelling, but the whole thing feels so sketchily developed that it's impossible to care. The performances are equally lackluster, with Coon surprisingly listless and her male co-stars failing to make much of an impression. Only Lozano shines in her too-brief role as the sexually frustrated test subject. Daniel Aukin's staging fails to bring much coherence to the proceedings...All told, "Placebo" could well have benefited from a dose of theatrical Viagra.

Jesse Green, Vulture: Like her earlier plays What Rhymes with America and [sic], it's smart, droll, and beautifully performed, but so aesthetically anomic you may feel like pounding it (or yourself) on the head with a hammer...And so despite terrific performances from Carrie Coon as Louise and William Jackson Harper as Jonathan, the play doesn't really land. I'm not sure it means to; the director Daniel Aukin...actually seems to emphasize Placebo's flatness in pacing, tone, and design...There's plenty to like here, but as for passion, maybe the play would benefit from some Resurgo.

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Photo Credit: Joan Marcus