Review - The Humans

I cannot believe it took me so long to get to The Humans!  I'm a big fan of Stephen Karam's, though I hadn't actually seen any of his plays performed before.  I have read them all and quite like his slant on things.  I waited too long to get tickets to the Off-Broadway production, then, after the play won the Tony, it was hard to find discount tickets to the Broadway production. Anyway, blah blah blah.  I finally got a TDF ticket and saw the show last night.

I was a bit afraid that having waited so long to see the show, after constantly hearing all the acclaim, I would find the evening a let down.  I'm thankful to say that didn't happen. I thoroughly enjoyed myself at The Humans and, in fact, want to go back for several reasons, which I'll describe below...

To start, as a gal from a middle class family in the midwest, I found so much to relate to in The Humans.  A loving, supportive family; parents who have no savings, but who want to make their children's lives better when they can (but maybe some of the kids resent when they can't); a sort-of reverse snobbery about the rich; a feeling that life is at a dead-end and it couldn't possibly move anywhere; a vague, unsettling feeling of dread when thinking about money and the future; and all other sorts of things.  I've read various reviews of the play that say 'but nothing happens!' and I rarely understand that kind of comment.  If you engage with the characters and their struggle, EVERYTHING happens.  So much happens that you can't even parse it out.  At least that's what I think, and definitely what I thought about this play.  I guess you could say there are spoiler-y things in what I say next.

photo credit: Brigitte Lacombe

Set at a family Thanksgiving dinner in an apartment in Chinatown, The Humans takes no time at all to introduce these realistic characters - parents, two daughters, a grandmother, and a boyfriend for one of the daughters - and it takes no time at all for us to know and root for them.  It's amazing to me how quickly I understood these people and was totally engaged in their highs and lows, their tiny sufferings and their mini-victories. The writing is that good and the acting is even better.  This is an amazing ensemble of real theater actors, first among equals are Tony-winners Jayne Howdyshell and Reed Birney.  They have created such intricate, layered, interesting, completely recognizable people out of seemingly-ordinary characteristics.  They're specific, yet they're universal. But really, everyone in the cast is terrific.  I ended up seeing the understudy for the boyfriend, which bummed me out a little, because Arian Moayed is one of my especial favorites.  He's one reason I would want to go back.

As the play goes on, and everyone starts to drink a little more and show their pain a little more boldly, there is a sort of existential dread that starts to permeate the evening. At the top of the show, there is noise above and it's explained away as a noisy neighbor.  But as the room gets darker (it's a basement apartment) and the noise gets louder, suddenly an oppression starts to set in.  It's as if the fear and pain are physically manifesting themselves in the apartment.  Not in a cliched, horror film type of way, but in an even scarier everyday kind of way.  I can't really describe it.  A big part of the script deals with dreams, especially the nightmares of the father, and the play starts to put him inside the nightmare (at least it seemed that way to me), although, and here's another reason I need to go back, I couldn't see a lot of what was happening.  Upstage center, back behind the main playing area, there was a door that represented a back door.  I was all the way to the far left in the mezzanine, so whenever people started walking out that door, I lost sight of them before they got there.  At one point during the chilling end of the play, I thought I saw something happening in that area, but I couldn't really tell because my view was blocked.  It wasn't until this morning when I chatted with a friend who has read the script that I got the full answer to what was going on.  I only wish I could've seen it - I think my already-excellent experience would've been even more heightened.

I just loved how the play felt as if we were actually watching a family in crisis instead of a play - a father fearing losing everyone he loves, a mother who is used to being treated as a second-class citizen in her own family but still plows forth with love, daughters who are close yet still rivals, a boyfriend who plays the peacemaker because he just wants to fit in, and a grandmother in the final stages of severe dementia - she has enough movement and lucidity to make her breakdown towards the end of the show so heartbreaking.  I sobbed so loudly, I made my seat neighbor laugh (more on that below).  Everyone's plight is taken seriously, no one is condescended to, Karam is remarkably sympathetic and even-handed with all of his characters, even when they behave badly.  I admired that greatly.  I admired The Humans greatly - it's a smart, well-crafted, surprising play that is grounded in things that make it timely and things that make it of all times.  Oh, and although I'm speaking a lot about fear and dread and disappointment, this play is remarkably funny as well, because it's so true to life.  You laugh because you recognize things, you laugh because you're simpatico with the characters, and then you cry.  Great great writing.  I highly recommend it.

Seat neighbor/theater experience-wise: I find having my bag checked before picking up my ticket at the box office and then again before entering the theater annoying.  I just do.  I also find the excruciatingly long lines to get into the theater annoying, though I admit that it was cool to see such a long line to get into a play, a NEW American play, that doesn't feature any movie/tv/reality stars; for some unknown reason, the entire row in front of me was empty (I would've moved except for the gent with the extreme unwashed fragrance in the front row, I didn't want to get any closer to that); the gal on my right was bored out of her mind, fidgeting constantly, and she laughed out loud when I started sobbing, and the gal on my left started easing her way out before the show even ended.  I don't know.  People are strange.

The Humans will be closing some time in January, I think - Reed Birney is going into the Tracy Letts play at Second Stage (which now becomes even more of a must-see event for me), and there's another production circling the Schoenfeld Theater, so, if you haven't seen this play yet, you must go now.  Discounts are available and I really think anyone who loves theater should give this new American play by a new(ish) American voice a try. Maybe it will seem to you that nothing happens, or maybe you'll be like me and feel like everything happens again and again...