Inspired by a true story, the play follows the trail of a young black con man, Paul, who insinuates himself into the lives of a wealthy New York couple, Ouisa and Flan Kittredge, saying he knows their son at college.
Producer Stuart Thompson announced that John Guare's critically acclaimed play Six Degrees of Separation will return to Broadway in a revival starring seven-time Emmy Award winner Allison Janney ("Mom," The Girl on the Train) as Ouisa and Tony Award winner John Benjamin Hickey (The Normal Heart, "Manhattan") as Flan.
Trip Cullman (Significant Other, Punk Rock) will direct the production, which is set to open at the Barrymore Theatre in April 2017 and will run for 15 weeks only.
The play's most significant painting, a Kandinsky, hangs over all the action-and what does its centrality finally tell us? Perhaps, for one, that this a play about the perversity of worth: of the works of art that Ouisa and Flan are so engaged in dealing with, and-in contrast-of a human life, Paul's, which they show a terrible incomprehension about. Well, it's worth a lot of money, and its deeper significance, as Paul signals to Ouisa, is one of interpretation; the two great knots-material and psychological--of the play on one canvas. In the end, Paul, whatever has happened to him, has the power of that knowledge. Which may not be worth much, but it's something.
On the evidence of the spectacular revival that opened tonight at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, with a cast led by Allison Janney (Mom, The West Wing), Corey Hawkins (Straight Outta Compton) and John Benjamin Hickey (The Normal Heart), either it's been a very long moment that Guare captured. Or, more likely, Six Degrees transcends its particulars and addresses something ineffably human: The terrifying gulf between how we see ourselves and how we need others to see us. That's a theme for the ages, from Moliere to Arthur Miller to Tony Kushner. Guare, however, using a brief, intriguing newspaper report as his jumping off point, found a way in Six Degrees to make us laugh in the face of our own insufficiency in bridging that midnight-dark gulf.
1990 | Off-Broadway |
Off-Broadway |
1990 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
2010 | West End |
Old Vic Production West End |
2017 | Broadway |
Broadway Revival Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2017 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Corey Hawkins |
2017 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Allison Janney |
2017 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Broadway or Off-Broadway Play | Six Degrees of Separation |
2017 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Actress in a Play | Allison Janney |
2017 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play | Corey Hawkins |
2017 | Tony Awards | Best Revival of a Play | Six Degrees of Separation |
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