City Theater’s production of Hand to God is Pittsburgh’s premiere of Robert Askin’s Tony-nominated play. For imagination alone, Askins deserved that nomination. For outrageousness and irreverence, his play takes the prize; Hand to God features the dirtiest mouthed church puppet you’ll meet. And human characters who are dealing with the dangerous emotional and psychological demons life deals us.
7 comments:
using puppetry in any form of theater has a power. I always like seeing when puppetry and comedy mix because it goes so well together in shows such as avenue Q. The shows approach from a religious standpoint is great to i think that it most definatley will strike a chord with those in the audience who grew up in that church atmosphere. It is also interesting making the puppet this sort of Satan figure because it gives a face to what is bad in our lives and probably alows he play to talk about some heavy stuff because of that.
Ahhh I so badly want to see this show! I remember when this show was on Broadway, but I dismissed it because I knew nothing and I have never been a huge hand puppet fan. A couple of my friends saw it last weekend, and our directing professor mentioned it in class, which brought my interest back to the play. Now, reading this review, I really really want to see it. I had never known the plot before, and it seems like a really interesting and unique story. I am very interested to see how the two different Tyrone hand puppets are used, and how the puppeteers are able to convey the personalities of the puppets using just their voices and hands, while simultaneously acting their own parts. If I see it this weekend, hopefully I can comment on the other article that has been posted about this show so far this week, and I can give my official opinion on the show. For now, my opinion is that I really want to see it and it sounds very interesting.
Hand to God at City Theater is another local production that I really hope that I get to see. I have read the play before, and normally I can not get into the play by just reading it. This is because I am a very visual person who likes to see things instead of imagining it. However, when I read Hand to God I literally died laughing it was so funny. I can only begin to imagine what City Theater has done with this fantastic play. They are a quite amazing little theater in this city that I feel gets overshadowed by some of the larger companies. However, this is a perfect play for this company. My thought behind this is that it is a very intimate bold play that will fit perfectly into their space. I truly hope that I am able to go see a performance.
Last winter I organized a trip with my friends to see Hand to God on broadway. They were doing amazing discount tickets for around $20 during previews. Me and eight of my friends went and saw this show. I walked in having no exceptions. I walked out amazed. The puppetry done during the show was amazing. The lead made it seem like he was one with the puppet. If i get the chance to see it here, I would love to see how he uses the puppet and makes the role his own. Also how will a non New York audience take such a risky piece. Hopefully it will be successful.
This article seemed less like a review and more like City Theater themselves wrote it with just how complimentary it was. They had naught a critical thing to say whatsoever about the show. It was a good show, but wow this article loved it.
I love the script of Hand To God and it gives everyone who performs it so much to work with. I thought City Theater did really well with it, but I do have some critiques. The design was awesome,with the scenic design working perfectly. Some of the characters perhaps could have used more time to flesh out. LaMedica, who plays Jason and Tyrone does do an excellent physical job of being simultaneously the puppet and himself. To be able to manipulate both one's facial expressions and a puppet's is difficult and he does it well. His verbal timing with the puppet was off in scenes when he was alone with it however. Rather than having a quick, one after another conversation between Tyrone's voice and his own, there were too long of pauses in between, showing that though he has physical puppet training perhaps the ventriloquism needed some work. But that is a tall order for a regional theater production since the original Broadway Jason worked for years with his puppet. Again, comparing it to that, LaMedica's Tyrone was not always as devilish as perhaps he could've been with rather than a satan-y voice, he had more of a Bert from Sesame Street voice. This may have been a choice to discern the role from the Broadway one, but I am not sure it worked. However overall, he took on an incredibly difficult role well. The Texas accents were quite lovely and charming, and the Pastor was a very real portrayal of a small, Southern pastor. He seemed straight out of where I'm from. Overall, I had a great time finally seeing this script that I loved, and think they did a pretty good job of performing it.
I really love this show, and I'm disappointed I haven't gone to see it yet, but it's on my list. I read the play last year and I thought it was just so simply hilarious, I would love to be able to see it out into action. Cassidy and Jamie went to go it this past weekend and said it was phenomenal. Puppetry is something that is really hard to do well, I have seen an excruciatingly high number of productions of Avenue Q where it just looks campy or sloppy to to take on a show with pupppetry is to ask a lot of you actors and of the audience. It means that sitting there you have to funny immerse yourself totally in what the show is selling because the second you sort of acknowledge that you are looking at bunch of people use puppets and not just watching living puppets the story loses its power. Aside from that I almost never go out to see a show in Pittsburgh which I blame on the amount of work I have but most of the time it's just laziness. This is good incentive to get out there and try and see some more things, and become a little more involved in the theater scene of Pittsburgh. I think Jamie is definitely right though when she says that this article seemed a little too overwhelmingly positive to be a real real review. Positive reviews are good but this is Hand to God in PA not the original cast of Hamilton. There has to be some room for improvement and I would have liked to hear more in the article about what was lacking or could be improved.
I really love this show, and I'm disappointed I haven't gone to see it yet, but it's on my list. I read the play last year and I thought it was just so simply hilarious, I would love to be able to see it out into action. Cassidy and Jamie went to go it this past weekend and said it was phenomenal. Puppetry is something that is really hard to do well, I have seen an excruciatingly high number of productions of Avenue Q where it just looks campy or sloppy to to take on a show with pupppetry is to ask a lot of you actors and of the audience. It means that sitting there you have to funny immerse yourself totally in what the show is selling because the second you sort of acknowledge that you are looking at bunch of people use puppets and not just watching living puppets the story loses its power. Aside from that I almost never go out to see a show in Pittsburgh which I blame on lack of time but really it is just laziness, so I think this show will be a good push for me get out there and see more things in PA, and better understand the way this city operates as a relatively large one with a booming theater scene. Overall, I’m happy this show is, and will continue to reach large audiences because it’s hilarious and a great piece of theater.
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