Review Roundup: Immersive THE GREAT GATSBY Opens in NYC

Immersive Everywhere’s production of The Great Gatsby – The Immersive Show is now open off-Broadway! Adapted and directed by Alexander Wright, the UK’s longest-running immersive production makes its American and New York debut in Gatsby Mansion in the Park Central Hotel New York (870 Seventh Avenue), a Highgate managed hotel.

The company of The Great Gatsby – The Immersive Show includes Joél Acosta as Jay Gatsby (Aloha Boricua), Rob Brinkmann as Nick Carraway (Oklahoma at Mac-Haydn Theatre), Jillian Anne Abaya as Daisy Buchanan (“Asleep, Awake”), Shahzeb Hussain as Tom Buchanan (Tammany Hall), Stephanie Rocío as Jordan Baker (Hurts to Hate You A Little at The Wild Project), Keivon Akbari as George Wilson (Tosca Tehran at Atlantic Theater Company), Claire Saunders as Myrtle Wilson (Importance of Being Earnest), Mya Rosado-Tran as Charlie McKee (Off-Broadway debut), Nicholas Caycedo as Joey (Good Morning New York), Kiki Burns as Lucille (Legally Blonde at CDA Summer Theatre), Anika Braganza as Gilda (singer, songwriter with The Braganza Sisters), Charlie Marcus as Meyer Wolfsheim (A Bronx Tale The Musical), Jeremiah Ginn as Owl Eyes (Murder For Two), and Stephanie Cha as Kitty Klipspringer (Mr. Holland’s Opus at Ogunquit Playhouse), and stage managers Kristin Dwyer (Production Stage Manager), Giles T. Horne (Assistant Stage Manager), Emily Venezia (Assistant Stage Manager) and Rachael Wilkin (Assistant Stage Manager). 

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

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Maya Phillips, The New York Times: There ain’t no party like a Jay Gatsby party — in “The Great Gatsby,” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s debonair poster boy of American ambition and the nouveau riche never lets the festivities stop. Neither does Immersive Everywhere’s “The Great Gatsby: The Immersive Show,” a jovial feast for the senses that never, in its lagging two-and-a-half-hour running time, truly rises above the status of a mere attraction.

Tim Teeman, The Daily Beast: Going back nine further times would yield other revelations, and perhaps darker dramas, in other rooms. But what to do if, like us, you are just going once? Well, judging not just by the book, but also the flurries of drama on the floor, our perhaps predictable recommendation would be to try and stick close to Nick, Gatsby, and Daisy. This won’t always be possible, as you may find yourself in a clutch of people suddenly dragooned somewhere else, but once you identify those characters, sidle over to them. Did we learn anything new about The Great Gatsby? No, not in the way that Gatz’s full recitation so stunningly opened up Fitzgerald’s text. This immersive experience is more revelry-minded, although when the world of Gatsby and the Buchanans falls apart—and the main stage is suddenly illuminated by shafts of funereal light, and Gatsby himself appears in a fateful bathing suit—it rightly slows and leans into its foundational profundity.

Chris Jones, The New York Daily News: But this is an inventive and intriguingly populist new staging of an iconic novel that already has informed all manner of adaptations. Here, it is genuinely hard to tell the actors from the customers, only the elegant design of Vanessa Leuck’s costumes offers a meaningful distinction. And I was most impressed by the work of a tough stage management person whose job clearly was to spot any and all phones and tell startled people that they did not belong in this environment, even during intermission, and to put them away immediately or take it and themselves way, way outside to the normal world. Cowed souls obeyed. Clearly they were enjoying the party, but they did not want to end up like Myrtle.

Gillian Russo, New York Theatre Guide: It is worth noting here that Gatsby is truly both immersive and interactive — you're not just in the world, watching the characters around you, but they're actively engaging with you throughout. Besides dancing with them during the aforementioned Charleston (the first of multiple dance breaks), you might supply Nick with a pickup line to use on sophisticated golfer Jordan Baker, take a photo with Jordan (as I did), or be enlisted by Gatsby himself as his personal assistant while he fretfully prepares to host Daisy for tea (as my +1 did). As such, guests are encouraged to dress to theme (or at least dress up), and you run the risk of Gatsby remarking on it if you don't: "Most of you are dressed impeccably," he observes as he's perfecting his tea setup, then quips: "Please stand in front of someone who is not."

Joey Sims, Theatrely: Landing in New York before any of them, though, is Great Gatsby: The Immersive Show, which opened in a custom-designed space within Park Central Hotel following a multi-year run in London. Immersive Gatsby is a mixed success, undeniably enjoyable at points but ultimately felled by the limitations of its venue and the challenge of reconciling its immersive format with the novel’s social critiques. 

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