Dog Day Afternoon Broadway Reviews

While the dialogue keeps reminding you of the grit and grime of 1970s Brooklyn, this play is firmly a product of the family-friendly Broadway of today. Even the inevitably doomed conclusion to the robbery is given a new addition that allows audiences...

While the dialogue keeps reminding you of the grit and grime of 1970s Brooklyn, this play is firmly a product of the family-friendly Broadway of today. Even the inevitably doomed conclusion to the robbery is given a new addition that allows audiences some easy uplift. There’s nothing wrong with comic escapism, and this show has verve and momentum that is easy to enjoy. It helps if you have never seen the movie.

Under the direction of Rupert Goold, the production leans into broadness. Scenes that should crackle instead drift into exaggerated, sometimes sitcom-like exchanges, leaving the show caught awkwardly between hostage thriller and ensemble comedy. Even...

Under the direction of Rupert Goold, the production leans into broadness. Scenes that should crackle instead drift into exaggerated, sometimes sitcom-like exchanges, leaving the show caught awkwardly between hostage thriller and ensemble comedy. Even the impressive revolving set, which fluidly shifts between the bank interior and the surrounding street, begins to feel overworked, with repeated transitions that stall rather than build momentum.

To fill the holes left by suspense and realism, Guirgis offers broad jokes about drug use, office politics and the romantic lives of the ladies who work at the bank (who, thanks to overmiking, scream their gossip from the outset). There is also endle...

To fill the holes left by suspense and realism, Guirgis offers broad jokes about drug use, office politics and the romantic lives of the ladies who work at the bank (who, thanks to overmiking, scream their gossip from the outset). There is also endless blathering by Ortiz’s Detective Fucco, who has been named Fucco just so that his name can be insulting mispronounced by a snide FBI agent, Sheldon (Spencer Garrett), whose every on-the-hard-nose line sounds like a South Park parody of his character. (“If this was my case to command, I could make dinner reservations for 7:30 this evening, assure the missus I wouldn’t be late, and be at the bar with a tall gin ricky by 7:15. But hey, this is your thing. And when you screw it up royally—I’ll be here to clean up your mess.”) Not all the well-chosen Brenda Abbandandolo costumes and David Bowie songs in the world can disguise this production’s flaws. Guirgis has written plays that capture the spirit of New York City in vibrant and original ways. But this one? This one’s a dog.

Despite providing some meaty roles to talented actors, Dog Day Afternoon feels like a really expensive workshop of a play that could have used a few more rounds of revisions to better balance and update the material and its tricky swirl of elements. ...

Despite providing some meaty roles to talented actors, Dog Day Afternoon feels like a really expensive workshop of a play that could have used a few more rounds of revisions to better balance and update the material and its tricky swirl of elements. The unanswered question here is: Why? Why turn this classic movie into a stage play? It’s as if Warner Bros. Theatricals barged into a theater, guns in hand but without a fully fleshed-out plan, and then had to cobble together an escape on the fly where nobody loses too much face (or their lives).

Compared to the movie, the playwright has given many of the other characters more lines, backstories and heightened personalities. The head teller Colleen (the always reliable Jessica Hecht) is even more forward and fearless, arguing with her captors...

Compared to the movie, the playwright has given many of the other characters more lines, backstories and heightened personalities. The head teller Colleen (the always reliable Jessica Hecht) is even more forward and fearless, arguing with her captors, even outright reprimanding them like a dean of discipline (“Is she always like this? With the stick up her ass?” Sonny asks her co-worker plaintively.) Ortiz as the detective is a talkative mensch, the FBI agent Sheldon (Spence Garrett) harshly condescending to him. In general, the production plays up the comedy in the first act — The bank robbers are now far more clownishly inept — which at times feels overdone, as if the creative team is straining to distinguish itself from the movie. Certain scenes also have been altered, mostly to reflect the difference in what’s do-able live on stage versus on film, although David Korins set, which revolves to show the inside and the outside of the bank, largely keeps the action flowing, and the sound design by Cody Spencer fills in for the montage of street scene in the movie.

It may seem unfair to judge “Dog Day” so closely to its venerated source material, and Giurgis and Goold admirably don't settle for a carbon copy of the film. But what is ultimately to be gained by making this a hammy, Neil Simon-esque romp? When...

It may seem unfair to judge “Dog Day” so closely to its venerated source material, and Giurgis and Goold admirably don't settle for a carbon copy of the film. But what is ultimately to be gained by making this a hammy, Neil Simon-esque romp? When you deprive the audience of any real tension or emotional stakes, what is there left to grasp?

Director Rupert Goold (Tammy Faye, Patriots, Ink) strains to infuse the proceedings with theatricality via such devices as having policeman stride down the theater’s aisles aiming guns at the stage. The high point, as you might expect, is the ico...

Director Rupert Goold (Tammy Faye, Patriots, Ink) strains to infuse the proceedings with theatricality via such devices as having policeman stride down the theater’s aisles aiming guns at the stage. The high point, as you might expect, is the iconic scene in which Sonny exits the bank and screams “Attica! Attica!” at the crowd. In this case, the audience serves as the onlookers, even shouting back at Bernthal as if they were at a Mamma Mia! Sing-along.

Bernthal tackles the role with gusto. His shouting and bluster are covers for a guy with a good heart. At one point he says “Admittedly we’re off to a rough start…this is my first robbery.” And it’s fun to watch him relish his newfound plat...

Bernthal tackles the role with gusto. His shouting and bluster are covers for a guy with a good heart. At one point he says “Admittedly we’re off to a rough start…this is my first robbery.” And it’s fun to watch him relish his newfound platform as a folk hero who sees himself as a defender of the city’s disenfranchised. Sonny’s ultimate motive involves a gay component which, in 1975, must have been rather shocking. Even today, it elicited some startled gasps from the audience. The introduction of Sonny’s “wife”, Leon (Esteban Andres Cruz), allows Bernthal to display a tender side. And the brutal honesty in their scene together is touchingly poignant.

My ultimate feeling about “Dog Day Afternoon” as a play comes down to something so obvious it feels almost unfair to say it out loud, but I will anyway: The movie was so much better. As a director, Sidney Lumet was a volatile master of urban spac...

My ultimate feeling about “Dog Day Afternoon” as a play comes down to something so obvious it feels almost unfair to say it out loud, but I will anyway: The movie was so much better. As a director, Sidney Lumet was a volatile master of urban space and atmosphere, and Pacino’s Sonny is, quite simply, one of the indelible characters in movie history. Bernthal does a solid job portraying this angry, tormented, messed-up Brooklyn fireplug, and in some ways he gets closer to who the real Sonny was. But he doesn’t haunt us with the grandeur of his delusions the way Pacino did. It never tears us apart to see this dog have his day.

Bernthal ably anchors the production. With just a slight trace of Pacino’s cadence and voice, he’s alternately intense and likable. Moss-Bachrach is convincing as a depressed loose cannon. Jessica Hecht, per usual, lends fine support as head tell...

Bernthal ably anchors the production. With just a slight trace of Pacino’s cadence and voice, he’s alternately intense and likable. Moss-Bachrach is convincing as a depressed loose cannon. Jessica Hecht, per usual, lends fine support as head teller Colleen, who, in a twist to an iconic scene from the movie, instructs Sonny to scream “Attica!”

Director Rupert Goold is ill-suited to mitigate that sneering impulse. Goold has done good things on stage (King Charles III, among others) and decent things on film (Judy, for which Renée Zellweger won her second Oscar), but this particular milieu ...

Director Rupert Goold is ill-suited to mitigate that sneering impulse. Goold has done good things on stage (King Charles III, among others) and decent things on film (Judy, for which Renée Zellweger won her second Oscar), but this particular milieu favors none of his fortes. The action sequences, if we can call him that, are clunky, shouty jumbles. There is nary an ounce of tension to be found during the entirety of this supposedly heated stand-off. Goold doesn’t do much with David Korins’ impressively realistic set but rotate it back and forth depending on whether we’re inside the bank or outside of it.

At times the strain of keeping up the brisk timing of the movie to fill two hours of stage time on essentially a single set results in comic vamping. A passage in which an argument erupts over which nearby shop sells the best donuts, for instance, de...

At times the strain of keeping up the brisk timing of the movie to fill two hours of stage time on essentially a single set results in comic vamping. A passage in which an argument erupts over which nearby shop sells the best donuts, for instance, descends into absurdity when Mr. Eddy suddenly rises from his state of near-unconsciousness to offer his opinion. (Again with the shtick!) “Dog Day Afternoon” makes for a largely diverting evening, but like many if not most stage versions of beloved films it never entirely succeeds at laying to rest the ghosts of its cinematic past.

Oddly, it is during that act one closer, when Sonny rallies the audience into chanting the film’s famous “Attica!” cry, that the production feels most itself. It’s essentially Disney for Dads, a curious blend of head-patting nostalgia and ear...

Oddly, it is during that act one closer, when Sonny rallies the audience into chanting the film’s famous “Attica!” cry, that the production feels most itself. It’s essentially Disney for Dads, a curious blend of head-patting nostalgia and earnest artistry, delivered with a refreshing lack of cynicism. For all its flaws, and unlike its protagonists, Dog Day Afternoon is not trying to put one over anyone.

On stage, “Dog Day” also can’t duplicate the crowd scenes outside the bank that distinguish the movie version, where Sonny becomes an instant folk hero to the bystanders. In a masterstroke of writing and direction, Guirgus and Goold turn the th...

On stage, “Dog Day” also can’t duplicate the crowd scenes outside the bank that distinguish the movie version, where Sonny becomes an instant folk hero to the bystanders. In a masterstroke of writing and direction, Guirgus and Goold turn the theater audience into those very willing enablers.

Guirgis also seems to assume everyone in the audience either knows the movie or has their brain turned off for the first act, since there’s no explanation until the second act for why the seemingly decent Sonny has turned to a life of crime. When i...

Guirgis also seems to assume everyone in the audience either knows the movie or has their brain turned off for the first act, since there’s no explanation until the second act for why the seemingly decent Sonny has turned to a life of crime. When it comes, it’s a doozy: the once-married Sonny is now gay and wants the money so his cross-dressing boyfriend Leon (Esteban Andres Cruz, making the most of his little stage time) can have transgender surgery. Sadly, Leon isn’t sure he wants the surgery – or a life with Sonny – and their brief phone call is quite heartbreaking.

Music is another highlight of the production, which features excerpts of period classics by the likes of David Bowie and Marvin Gaye; David Korins’s scenic design and Brenda Abbandandolo’s costumes also evoke the era with stylish authenticity. In...

Music is another highlight of the production, which features excerpts of period classics by the likes of David Bowie and Marvin Gaye; David Korins’s scenic design and Brenda Abbandandolo’s costumes also evoke the era with stylish authenticity. In its general inclination for overstatement, though, this “Dog Day Afternoon” feels very contemporary.

I don’t begrudge directors for taking their artistic liberties. But unjustified choices like this come across as uninspired, especially when the play tries so hard to tell the audience that it’s 1972. There are too many references to historical e...

I don’t begrudge directors for taking their artistic liberties. But unjustified choices like this come across as uninspired, especially when the play tries so hard to tell the audience that it’s 1972. There are too many references to historical events, like when the hostaged bank tellers talk about Bella Abzug or when the cops and the FBI agents quarrel about New York City being on the brink of bankruptcy. When we enter the theater, a neon red sign indicating the date — Aug. 22, 1972 — is all we can see on stage. We know when and where we are. We don’t need it spoonfed with every cultural reference.

Make no mistake, Bernthal is spirited, lively and quite effective, And although Moss-Bachrach seemed to me to be playing pretty much the same character as he does on “The Bear,” his sardonic introversion is always intriguing to watch, not least b...

Make no mistake, Bernthal is spirited, lively and quite effective, And although Moss-Bachrach seemed to me to be playing pretty much the same character as he does on “The Bear,” his sardonic introversion is always intriguing to watch, not least because he is so good at suggesting that momentous personal stakes are in play with every minor moment. Jessica Hecht, playing one of the hostages, adds her typically off-beat depth, and I was most amused by John Ortiz as the FBI agent with the standard G-man voice and personality to match.

Strangely, Guirgis, who’s caringly created transgender characters before, fumbles the characterization of Leon (Esteban Andres Cruz), whose need for expensive gender-affirming surgery spurred Sonny’s heist plan in the first place. What played in ...

Strangely, Guirgis, who’s caringly created transgender characters before, fumbles the characterization of Leon (Esteban Andres Cruz), whose need for expensive gender-affirming surgery spurred Sonny’s heist plan in the first place. What played in 1975 as an impressively humanizing mainstream depiction of a trans woman struggling with her mental health becomes a coarse stereotype here of promiscuity (“I’m like McDonald’s—over a million served!”). That’s a cheapening approach, and it makes Sonny’s motivations hard to believe in too.

The new stage version of Dog Day Afternoon runs up against the unintended speed bump of hindsight. Details that in the film felt like canny, offhand snapshots of the 1970s now come across as self-conscious in Stephen Adly Guirgis’s production, and ...

The new stage version of Dog Day Afternoon runs up against the unintended speed bump of hindsight. Details that in the film felt like canny, offhand snapshots of the 1970s now come across as self-conscious in Stephen Adly Guirgis’s production, and even cutesy as the play attempts to re-create famous scenes from the movie with greater retrospective context (to say nothing of eye-rolling additional historical color, like having characters mention that this dirty movie called Deep Throat is now playing at a theater near them). At times, it’s hard not to think of Wes Anderson’s film Rushmore, in which the precocious Max Fischer Players put on a theatrical version of Pacino’s similarly true-life thriller Serpico.

Watching Moss-Bachrach, who can lead with his chest when he wants to, skulk in the shadows, so sad and sullen and aloof, keeping an uneasy eye on Sonny the way a frightened child monitors a parent, I wondered what it would feel like for him and Bernt...

Watching Moss-Bachrach, who can lead with his chest when he wants to, skulk in the shadows, so sad and sullen and aloof, keeping an uneasy eye on Sonny the way a frightened child monitors a parent, I wondered what it would feel like for him and Bernthal to swap parts. Flip a coin at each performance to see who’s the light and who’s the dark. For all the mess and muddle we find them in, the protagonists of Dog Day Afternoon balance and care for one another. The play in turn makes us care for them, out there in all their recklessness on the edge of the night. In doing so, it still serves as a reminder that love, too, is political.

To be clear, I'm not sure any actor could make this Dog Day Afternoon work. It's not just that Bernthal will be compared to Pacino. It's that a stage performance is being asked to do what a film performance only did with one of the greatest actors of...

To be clear, I'm not sure any actor could make this Dog Day Afternoon work. It's not just that Bernthal will be compared to Pacino. It's that a stage performance is being asked to do what a film performance only did with one of the greatest actors of a generation. Bernthal is a great actor, as seen in The Bear, The Punisher, and The Accountant 2. He's dynamic, complex, exciting, and charming, with a sense of danger. On paper, he's perfect for this attempt. But he cannot fill this Broadway theater with the energy of desperation, outrage, and life-or-death terror.

The show isn’t in any way perfect. Guirgis’s jokes don’t always land, and the treatment of the Security Guard character is ridiculous, even for a comedy. In addition, most of the bank staff, except for Colleen, have little nuance. And the FBI a...

The show isn’t in any way perfect. Guirgis’s jokes don’t always land, and the treatment of the Security Guard character is ridiculous, even for a comedy. In addition, most of the bank staff, except for Colleen, have little nuance. And the FBI agent is just a cartoon. Also, the way the Sonny and Leon (Esteban Andres Cruz) story is handled will definitely divide people—especially those pesky woke watchdogs. I had no issue with it. But I do wish they’d been given a scene together instead of a phone call. So many liberties have already been taken with the real story, why not take a significant one and show us a true connection? All that said, it’s a hilarious and satisfying evening of theater—if you are willing to let it be its own thing.