"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby
September 15, 2024 | Off-Broadway | Classic Stage Company | Matinee | Play | Original | 2H 50M
A harrowing play about Polish classmates-turned-enemies during WWII. The story begins with ten children, half Polish and half Jewish, playing together at school and goes through the rest of their fraught, violent lives. And I think ultimately this story would have been better served as a novel. Though the stage design is minimal chalkboard and projection, the direction is too busy and unnecessary and detracts from the story. The play begins like it's a reading or workshop, and melds into an exposition-heavy ensemble production.
It's difficult to critique plays of this subject matter. I am not here to argue that we don't need plays about Jewish stories during the 1940s, but I have seen so many these last few years alone and each one seems to delve deeper into an almost torture-porn-esque tone. This particular story has multiple depictions of sexual assault, one of which is a weirdly romanticized gang rape, so that was... The play as a whole has a valuable and intriguing concept and storyline, but I didn't care for this execution. At least ten audience members left after intermission. It's a long show that has its moments, but three hours of increasingly upsetting and over-directed material overstays its welcome. The opening is especially rough and overdrawn, and I could easily see half an hour or more shaved off this production without damaging the integrity of the story.
Verdict: Well...I'm Glad I Saw It
