Written by Stephen Karam First performance 30 September 2015 Original language English language | Subject Family Playwright Stephen Karam | |
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Date premiered September 30, 2015 (2015-09-30) Characters Erik; Deirdre; Richard; Fiona "Momo" Blake; Aimee; Brigid Setting An apartment in lower Manhattan Place premiered Roundabout Theatre Company – Laura Pels Theatre Similar The Color Purple, Eclipsed, Shuffle Along, She Loves Me, Long Day's Journey Into Night | ||
the humans
The Humans is a one-act play written by Stephen Karam. The play opened on Broadway in 2016 after an engagement Off-Broadway in 2015. The Humans was a finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and won the 2016 Tony Award for Best Play.
Contents
Reed birney and jayne houdyshell on the unexpected life of broadway s the humans
Productions
The play had its world premiere at the American Theater Company, Chicago, Illinois in November 2014, directed by PJ Paparelli. Chris Jones, in his review for the Chicago Tribune, wrote: "kind, warm, beautifully observed and deeply moving new play, a celebration of working-class familial imperfection and affection and a game-changing work for this gifted young playwright."
The Humans opened Off-Broadway at the Laura Pels Theatre on September 30, 2015 in previews, and officially on October 25, 2015 in a limited run produced by the Roundabout Theatre Company, with positive reviews, and ran until January 3, 2016. It transferred to Broadway to the Helen Hayes Theatre, opening on February 18, 2016 and closing at the Helen Hayes Theatre on July 24, 2016. The play then transferred to the Schoenfeld Theatre opening on August 9, 2016. (The Helen Hayes will have major renovations starting in August 2016.) The play closed its Broadway engagement on January 15, 2017. After closing, the play will have a US national tour, starting in November 2017 at the Seattle Repertory Theater.
Directed by Joe Mantello, the Off-Broadway cast featured Cassie Beck (Aimee), Reed Birney (Erik), Jayne Houdyshell (Deirdre), Lauren Klein (Fiona "Momo" Blake), Arian Moayed (Richard), and Sarah Steele (Brigid). The Off-Broadway cast moved to Broadway.
Synopsis
At Thanksgiving, the Blake family gathers at the run-down Manhattan apartment in Chinatown of Brigid Blake and her boyfriend Richard. Brigid's parents, Erik Blake and Deirdre Blake, arrive from their home in Scranton, Pennsylvania, to have dinner with Brigid, Richard and Aimee, their other adult daughter. Brigid is a musician and Aimee is a lawyer, living in Philadelphia. Aimee has recently broken up with her girlfriend and has developed an intestinal ailment. Also present is Erik's mother Fiona "Momo", who has Alzheimer's Disease. The parents are unhappy that their daughters have left home and have abandoned their religion. The family members must deal with "aging, illness, and a changing economy".
Critical response
In his review of the Broadway production in The New York Times, Charles Isherwood called it the "finest new play of the Broadway season so far" and praised the cast, direction, and the set "...that perfectly captures the unsettled atmosphere the writing so deftly establishes."
Jesse Green, reviewing the Broadway production for Vulture, wrote: "With its irrational layout and strange, sickening noises, the apartment, as the stage directions put it, is 'effortlessly uncanny,' as is the play itself... It is still the most, well, human play I’ve ever seen about fear and disappointment and the attachments that transcend them."
The Pulitzer Prize committee said of the play: "A profoundly affecting drama that sketches the psychological and emotional contours of an average American family."