Short Reviews of Long Shows

so mini they’re basically just spoilers

One way to deal with a script that’s too long…. (Photo by Kalea Jerielle on Unsplash)

I went to see three things that were each way too long in their own ways this week, so I’ve decided to review them all in as short a space as possible:

1. The Hills of California: Written by Jez Butterworth who is famous enough that many people went to see the play just because he was the playwright, this huge casts plays two sets of the same quartet. The play examines one event from many points of view, showing that memory is fallible. The play’s running time is almost three hours, the first hour seems devoted to weeding out audience members who aren’t going to get the point anyway (I’d estimate about a quarter of the house left, muttering that they couldn’t understand a word — everyone else spent first intermission asking others who understood the accents to catch them up). The second and third act dive deep into the horrible way that the girl-band broke up, leaving lots of time for the girls to sing both in the “present” when they are in their 50s and in the “past” when they are in their teens. They are extremely talented. However, the real emotional core of the play is not intentional: at some point after the play is over, you will find yourself in conversation over which sound you prefer. And you will discover that every single person prefers the angelic, innocent, bubbly sound of the pre-teen girls — inadvertently (and in a…