Becky Shaw

Synopsis

"I’m also going to give you some advice. Your husband is not the Red Cross. The last time he started consoling a cute, suicidal chick, he married her" From the moment that Becky arrives overdressed for her blind date with straight-talking Max, it’s clear the evening won’t go to plan. In the immediate fallout, Becky becomes an object of devotion for her boss Andrew, who appears to have a fetish for vulnerable women. In turn Andrew’s wife Suzanna turns to her step-brother Max for comfort, and their mutual desire begins to resurface. Gina Gionfriddo’s play is a biting American comedy that enjoyed massive success Off-Broadway in 2009.

Our Review:

Michael Coveney - 21 January 2011

It turns out that the eponymous heroine of Gina Gionfriddo’s Off-Broadway play Becky Shaw is not a slip of the tongue; Gionfriddo was reading about Thackeray’s orphaned, impoverished, go-getting Becky Sharp in Vanity Fair when the idea took hold.

The result is an abrasively funny, brutal comedy of love, conspiracy and misunderstanding in New York, Rhode Island and Boston, as the gawky, no-mates Becky is set up as a blind date for Suzanna’s step-brother, the cold-blooded, cynical Max, and then comforted, after a mugging and suicide attempt, by Suzanna’s wannabe writer husband Andrew.

Suzanna is a trainee psychotherapist in a family blighted by financial misfortune: her bisexual father’s dead, and Max – whose own father was a failure and who was, in effect, “sold” into Susan’s family — is trying to sort things out. “Things” include his buried feelings for Suzanna.

Latest User Review

Paul Wallis - 7 March 2011:

Sorry this is a poor production. The storyline goes no where, there is no real connection between any of the characters, most of whom seem pointless and the writing at times gets sensationalist to make a point. Poor choice by the Almeida....

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