The New Group’s world premiere production of Rope, a new adaptation by Gordon Greenberg based on Patrick Hamilton’s classic thriller, officially opens tonight, November 3, at the Theater at St. Clement’s. Find out what the critics are saying!
Directed by Scott Elliott, the production stars Corey Fogelmanis, Elizabeth Gillies, Jason Butler Harner, Cameron Monaghan, Graham Phillips and James Waterston. Previews began October 13, with the limited Off-Broadway engagement scheduled to continue through December 6.
Inspired by the infamous Leopold and Loeb murder case, Rope follows Garrett Stern (Monaghan) and Nate Singer (Fogelmanis), two brilliant and dangerously bored Princeton graduate students who host a dinner party in their chic Turtle Bay apartment. Their guests are unaware that the hosts have concealed a murder victim’s body inside a trunk beneath the dinner festivities.
Greenberg’s adaptation reimagines the play that inspired Alfred Hitchcock’s 1948 film, bringing a contemporary perspective to the psychological thriller’s exploration of privilege, morality and murder.
The creative team includes scenic designer Derek McLane, costume designer Catherine Zuber, lighting designer Jeff Croiter, sound designer Leah Gelpe and wig designer Tom Watson. Intimacy and fight direction are by UnkleDave’s Fight-House.
Valerie A. Peterson serves as production stage manager, with production supervision by Five Ohm. Casting is by Geoff Josselson Casting, Geoff Josselson and Felicia Rudolph.
Kyle Turner, New York Theatre Guide: More compelling and sturdily articulated is Rope’s interest in the dinner party as a kind of shambolic theatre. The boundaries for good taste — in conversation, music, and decor — are sparklingly realized as the play asks which parts of ourselves we reveal to acquaintances and when. The characters’ intriguing transgressions, particularly when it comes to their furtive ability to mask their sexuality, class, or ethnicity in social spaces, offer more dramatic stakes than the body in the trunk.
Jonathan Mandell, New York Theater: There is a pivotal relationship between Garrett and the professor, Robert Cadell (Jason Butler Harner), a closeted gay man who introduced him to Nietzsche. There is an intriguing if faint suggestion that Garrett has been warped by the tyranny of the closet, but the few throwaway efforts at intellectual content in “Rope” do little to enhance what is essentially a genre play meant for thrills and chills.
Thom Geier , Culture Sauce: But this New Group production, under the direction of Scott Elliott, never achieves the compelling creepiness of the material’s previous iterations. What makes Hitchcock’s film such a cult favorite is not only the novelty of its subliminal gay messaging and the stagey set-up that made it appear to have been shot in one long take. It was the exquisite suspense that Hitchcock built into the criminals’ audacity, the threat of exposure that might come at any moment. With all the flashbacks and spotlighted soliloquies to the audience, the tension in this Rope keeps going slack precisely when it should be tightening.
Lane Williamson, ExeuntNYC: Following their incredible revival of The Adding Machine earlier this year, The New Group has produced another banger. Their new permanent home at the Theatre at St. Clement’s is proving to be the perfect synthesis of space and company. With Rope, they have another audacious, stylish, and captivating production.
Ron Fassler, Theater Pizzazz: Derek McLane’s set design is handsome and practical, and Catherine Zuber’s costumes serve the production well (particularly Gillies’s red and black outfit). Jeff Croiter’s lighting is beautiful, especially in shifting moods and tensions during the multiple flashback sequences. The thriller is a genre that has gone out of fashion, and every effort to bring it back should be welcome. But my frustrations with this production are best summed up by saying, “Skip Rope.”
Michael Sommers, New York Stage Review: Disappointingly, the tension among the story’s several cat-and-mouse games never grows sufficiently taut to grip one’s attention. In my experience, some among the company’s previous shows looked under-rehearsed, so perhaps Rope simply wasn’t ready for a press preview.
