Two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and Obie Award winner Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (An Octoroon) and Drama Desk Award winner Lila Neugebauer (The Waverly Gallery, 2ST’s Mary Page Marlowe) invite you to one helluva reunion in the darkly comic American family drama, APPROPRIATE.
It’s summer, the cicadas are singing, and the Lafayette family has returned to their late patriarch’s Arkansas home to deal with the remains of his estate. Toni (Paulson), the eldest daughter, hopes they’ll spend the weekend remembering and reconnecting over their beloved father. Bo, her brother, wants to recoup some of the funds he spent caring for Dad at the end of his life. But things take a turn when their estranged brother, Franz, appears late one night, and mysterious objects are discovered among the clutter. Suddenly, long-hidden secrets and buried resentments can’t be contained, and the family is forced to face the ghosts of their past.
It would also be easy to attribute the improvement to Neugebauer’s direction, which is so smart and swift for most of the play’s substantial length that you feel gripped by storytelling without being strangled by argument. Her staging, on a towering double-decker set by the design collective dots, is also nearly ideal, accentuating (with the help of Jane Cox’s painterly lighting) the conflicts and alliances among the characters. And the daredevil cast, instead of reveling in falling apart, focuses for as long as possible on keeping it together. We thus experience, in the force of that repression, just how awful human awfulness must be if human will cannot ultimately corral it.
Pay attention to those loud, annoying cicadas – they seem to have a story to tell. At least they do in Branden Jacobs-Jenkins superb, marvelously performed Appropriate, the Second Stage production opening tonight at the Helen Hayes Theater with one of the best casts – headed by an astonishing Sarah Paulson – on Broadway. A blistering family drama directed by Lila Neugebauer (easily matching her exemplary work in 2018’s The Waverly Gallery), Appropriate is a wicked cacophony of nerve-wrenching mystery, old resentments and laugh-out-loud comedy – the latter all the more remarkable coming, as it does, within a story about the darkest horrors of America’s legacies.
General Rush:
Price: $45
Where: Belasco Theatre box office
When: When the box office opens on the day of the performance.
Limit: Two per customer.
Information: Subject to daily availability. The box office opens Tuesday through Saturday at 10 AM ET and Sunday at 12 PM ET.
Digital Lottery:
Price: $45
Where: rush.telecharge.com
When: 12 AM ET, one day before the performance.
Limit: Two per customer
Information: Tickets are subject to availability. Seats may be partial view. Winners will be drawn that same morning at 10 AM ET and then later that afternoon at 3 PM ET.
2014 | Off-Broadway |
Signature Theatre Company Production Off-Broadway |
2023 | Broadway |
Second Stage Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Direction of a Play | Lila Neugebauer |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Featured Performance in a Play | Michael Esper |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Lead Performance in a Play | Sarah Paulson |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Lighting Design of a Play | Jane Cox |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Play | Appropriate |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Scenic Design of a Play | dots |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Sound Design of a Play | Bray Poor |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance | Sarah Paulson |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance | Corey Stoll |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Direction of a Play | Lila Neugebauer |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Play | Appropriate |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Direction of a Play (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Lila Neugebauer |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Lead Performer in a Broadway Play | Sarah Paulson |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Play | Appropriate |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Scenic Design (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | dots |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Costume Design of a Play | Dede Ayite |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Direction of a Play | Lila Neugebauer |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Lighting Design of a Play | Jane Cox |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play | Corey Stoll |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play | Sarah Paulson |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Revival of a Play | Appropriate |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Scenic Design of a Play | dots |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Sound Design of a Play | Bray Poor |
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