A Tenured Professor. A Talented Student. A Troubling Favor. The riveting and enthralling new play THE SOUND INSIDE is a stunningly suspenseful piece of theatre that proves: everyone has a story-the question is how it ends.
Tony, Golden Globe, Emmy winner Mary-Louise Parker will star in the Broadway premiere of THE SOUND INSIDE, written by Adam Rapp (Red Light Winter), directed by Tony Award winner David Cromer (The Band's Visit).
Ms. Parker will revisit her acclaimed performance as "Bella" in Rapp's new play following its world premiere last summer at Williamstown Theatre Festival (New York Times "Critic's Pick"). Will Hochman will make his Broadway debut reprising his role as "Christopher."
Unimpressed viewers could say that The Sound Inside is a gnomic short story pretending to be theater, but it's too liquid and rhetorical, too performative, to deserve that designation. (I've used it with other plays before.) Our presence in the room is essential to puzzling out of the facts presented to us, and Cromer's hushed, perfectly modulated staging unfolds with terrifying clarity, yet forces no conclusions on us. Hochman's Christopher, ardent but still the blank page of youth, brings off his swaggering lines with grace and humor. I didn't think I could revere Mary-Louise Parker more than I did, but arch, awkward Bella is one of her sharpest, funniest, most lived-in performances ever. Acerbic, detached, and monumentally sad, her Bella reminds any writer or lover of books why literature is the consolation of a lifetime, and sometimes a prison. The Sound Inside is a brilliant and unsettling portrait of a person who may escape death, but never the compulsion to transcribe that sentence that won't quit your head.
If 'The Sound Inside' has lost some of the intimacy that I previously found so arresting, it's only gained in richness and mystery. As Christopher strikes up an uneasy relationship with the professor and begins telling her the story of the novel he's trying to write, Rapp asks big questions about life, literature and the intersection between the two. How do we define honesty in fiction? Can we find salvation in art? How does one leave a mark on the world? 'The Sound Inside' offers few answers to these questions - and instead ends on note of jarring and spooky ambiguity. It's a brainy show that also pierces your heart, and it will leave you debating its meaning for days to come.
2018 | Williamstown, MA (Regional) |
World Premiere at Williamstown Theatre Festival Williamstown, MA (Regional) |
2019 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2020 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Lighting Design for a Play | Heather Gilbert |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Actor in a Play | Will Hochman |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Actress in a Play | Mary-Louise Parker |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Director of a Play | David Cromer |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Lighting Design | Heather Gilbert |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding New Broadway Play | The Sound Inside |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Projection Design | Aaron Rhyne |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Sound Design | Daniel Kluger |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Direction of a Play | David Cromer |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Lighting Design of a Play | Heather Gilbert |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Original Score | Daniel Kluger |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play | Mary-Louise Parker |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Adam Rapp |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Sound Design of a Play | Daniel Kluger |
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