Hir starring Felicity Huffman – Reviews Round-up

"Felicity Huffman blazes in show of rage against the patriarchy"

"Felicity Huffman delivers an excoriating, elemental performance in a play that is a Valkyrie howl of rage against the patriarchy. Her character, Paige, is a monster, but she’s a monster with a strong theatrical heritage — a 21st-century Medea who responds to her husband’s aggression by creating a living hell for those who oppose her."

"This isn’t date-night theatre, but if you’re looking for something that will pin you to your seat and leave everyone in the auditorium looking shell-shocked, then book your ticket now."

"In the director Steven Kunis’s remorselessly gripping production the audience is welcomed into chaos."

"In her return to the stage, this viscerally different take on motherhood blazes like a meteor self-destructing in the mesosphere."

"Challenging, confronting and comedic"

"Felicity Huffman shines in this sharp satire of patriarchy, gender and the need to return home"

"Both an unrelentingly bleak black-comedy and an erudite examination of identity politics, Taylor Mac’s absurdist satire has only grown more stingingly relevant since its 2015 premiere. Directed by Steven Kunis, this lucid revival is challenging, confronting and very funny, pitched precisely between grotesque parody and earnest debate."

"Transamerica star Felicity Huffman gives a gripping performance as Paige, diverting the anger of years of marital abuse into a boldly optimistic fantasy of complete liberation"

"Many may come to see this production, a revival of Taylor Mac’s culture wars blitzing play, based on the casting of former Desperate Housewife (and recent inmate) Felicity Huffman. But they’ll be richly rewarded with an intriguing, knotty drama that goes far beyond the category of star vehicle, delivered by an ensemble in which Huffman’s is just one of several eye-catching performances."

"Steven Kunis’ production grips from the start, only slowed by a protracted half hour interval (it’s elongated for a set change)"

"Felicity Huffman wreaks havoc in Taylor Mac’s black comedy"

"A rich and messy revival explores ideas of belonging, with the Desperate Housewives star playing a determinedly indifferent matriarch"

"This rich and messy revival of Taylor Mac’s black comedy is a story of debris, considering where our trauma settles inside us and what our violence leaves behind."

"... as the script sprawls in so many directions, with conceptual conversations sometimes overriding the drama, Steven Kunis’s production struggles to determine its focus. Huffman remains the production’s centrifugal force, her deep-seated distress simmering just below her delighted enlightenment."

"Felicity Huffman is a force of nature in her post-jail comeback"

"The Desperate Housewives star plays a very different type of matriarch here in this delirious wild satire of contemporary America"

"The deranged realism of Mac’s play is, initially a huge theatrical thrill in Stephen Kunis’s well-tooled revival."

"Mac’s writing has a detonating quality, the old pieties around gender in particular exploding like squibs within the play’s rapid fire dialogue, yet in the second half the play struggles to marshal the arguments into a coherent vision."

"... it also risks making the play feel like little more than a gruesomely entertaining fun house. That it avoids becoming so is almost entirely thanks to the truly terrific Huffman who somehow grounds Paige’s highfalutin dialogue within an earthy, always persuasive naturalism."

"Felicity Huffman is brilliantly, bitterly comic in this OTT study of identity"

"Seeing the American actor up close is a delight, though the play’s arch, studied madness does become overwhelming"

"It’s bizarre to see a screen luminary like Huffman, who won an Oscar playing a transgender woman in Transamerica in 2005, close up in a 200-seat venue in Finsbury Park"

"Her Paige exudes a kind of bleak glee at the implosion of her world but her language is always intricate, precise and sharp. Her explanation of how everyone in the world is trans, black and gay is a particular delight. Without her, the show would be hard to swallow."

"Felicity Huffman relaunches her career in a revival of this provocative curio from Taylor Mac"

"There’s definitely something compelling about Mac’s vision of patriarchy reclaimed by anarchic queerness. But ‘Hir’ is fundamentally a deeply bitter, cynical play, and in the second half its sense of mischief drains away as it becomes apparent that the seemingly free-spirited Paige is just as controlling and abusive as Arnold ever was."

"There’s a nicely anarchic household set from Ceci Calf. Steven Kunis directs competently. Huffman is perfectly good in her role as a free spirit with a deeply sinister side... Unfortunately, seven years has not simply done that much for the play: ‘Hir’ may feel marginally more timely, but it has nothing at its heart except a nihilistic shrug."