Review Roundup: RELEVANCE Opens at MCC Theater

MCC Theater (Robert LuPone, Bernard Telsey, William Cantler, Artistic Directors; Blake West, Executive Director) presents the third show of its 2017-18 season: the World Premiere of Relevance, written by J. Lee ("How to Get Away With Murder," "Looking") with direction by Tony Award® nominee Liesl Tommy (Eclipsed).

The cast features Tony Award® nominee, Outer Critics Circle and Obie Award winner Pascale Armand (Eclipsed), Molly Camp (The Heiress), and Emmy Award® nominee Richard Masur("Transparent," "Orange Is the New Black") and MCC alum Jayne Houdyshell (The Humans; A Doll's House, Part 2; Coraline at MCC Theater).

In Relevance, Theresa Hanneck is a celebrated author and veteran feminist warrior; Msemaji Ukweli is a promising young writer who is quickly becoming the leading cultural critic on race, class, and gender for a new generation. When a heated exchange between the two women goes viral, Theresa finds herself ill-equipped to manage her message in the social media era-especially against a rival whose time may have come. Directed by Tony Award® nominee Liesl Tommy, a collision of ideals within the feminist movement propels J. Lee's riveting drama from breathless start to surprising finish.

Let's see what the critics had to say!

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Ben Brantley, The New York Times: And given that this fall is going to be enacted by Ms. Houdyshell, a performer with a gift for finding original edges in familiar shapes, you can assume that you're going to be emotionally shaken, if not stirred, by the end of this MCC Theater production, directed at a faltering pace by Liesl Tommy. But as Ms. Houdyshell's Theresa starts to lose her confidence, so does the play itself.

Regina Robbins, Time Out New York: Like an All About Eve for the 21st century, Relevance stages a power struggle between ambitious women of different generations, with racial tension and internet culture added to the mix. The cast-which also includes Richard Masur and Molly Camp-is solid, and director Liesl Tommy does an impressive job of keeping the action lively even when the dialogue spins into highly intellectual territory, and Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew's stunning projections underscore the role of social media in driving a wedge between the old guard and the new. Fasten your seat belts: It's going to be a bumpy conference.

Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter: Houdyshell and Armand deliver compelling turns as the academic adversaries; the former's performance in a dialogue-heavy role is all the more impressive considering the wordy play's opening was delayed for last-minute rewrites. And director Liesl Tommy (Eclipsed) gives the work a smoothly polished staging, its impact abetted by Clint Ramos' versatile sets and Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew's impressive projections conveying the social-media whirligig so central to the plot. But despite the strenuous efforts of everyone involved, Relevance never succeeds in enlightening us as to why it matters.

Kathleen Campion, New York Theatre Guide: Houdyshell inhabits Theresa. From her first breath, she is completely the confident, angry feminist thinker she's playing, (I kept thinking I'd met her at rallies in the 70s.) Though she blusters and roars, she still gives us flashes of vulnerability, followed immediately by rage, in one case, and capitulation, in another. Once again Houdyshell gives us an entirely credible woman.

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