D+

Most reviews of this bleak one-act lead with admiring descriptions of Raul Abrego's realistically snowy, woodsy set, and go downhill from there. While there's a certain amount of respectful praise for some of the performances and stray kudos for Pedro Pascal's direction, nearly none of the critics are satisfied with Daniel Talbott's play, which is variously found lacking in action, drama, subtext, and insight. Only AP's Jennifer Farrar is duly impressed, though even she confesses feeling "numb" at the play's onslaught of misery.

B+

When it was announced, Wit seemed like the least necessary revival of the season, but reviewers are in general grateful for an opportunity to revisit the gradual demise of Vivian Bearing. Critics are split as to Nixon's performance, however. Many love her performance, and find the play greatly moving (as you can see, there are a handful of A's in this show's score). Some critics, apparently unfamiliar with the idea of character journeys, feel that Nixon comes across as too unlikeable at the beginning of the show, and feel the play does not really shine until her character is humanized in the second half. Who knows what they'd make of King Lear. Terry Teachout, meanwhile, pretty much hates the whole thing, finding that the script has not aged well and Nixon's performance misses the mark. He even compares it unfavorably to the television show House. Ouch.

B

Judging by the reviews, there seems to be no way to talk about Outside People without mentioning David Henry Hwang's Chinglish, which recently opened on Broadway and tackles the same inter-cultural subject matter and themes. Unfortunately, the comparison does Zayd Dohrn's play no favors. Although almost every review praises the "slick" production values, excellent direction, and strong performances, most reviewers are simply unconvinced by the story, characters, and deeper significance of the effort. Variety's Marilyn Stasio in particular spends the entire review questioning why we should care about the main character. The only truly positive review comes from Aaron Riccio at That Sounds Cool, who calls the play a "fully concieved work" without once mentioning that elephant-in-the-room on Broadway.

B+

Most critics rate Kevin Spacey's snide, snarling star turn in the role of Shakespeare's hunchback villain as some kind of triumph, though a consistent quibble surfaces even among many admirers, who find the sound and fury signifying less than advertised. This is true not only of Spacey's showy performance, they say, but of the stark, contemporary production Sam Mendes has directed around him. For a few critics, these problems are fatal (with Bloomberg's Jeremy Gerard filing an across-the-board pan), while for a few, they aren't problems at all, and for most, the quibbles largely pale next to the pleasures of Spacey's showmanship.

B

The consensus grade on this show is a little bit misleading, so let me, your friendly neighborhood Stagegrader, break it down for you: Critics generally agree that the first act of The Road To Mecca is a veritable snoozefest. Way too reverently directed, somnolently written, packed full of exposition with little-to-no sign of dramatic conflict or stakes. The only thing that sustains the audience's interest- and not all of the audience, one reviewer notes several sleeping people in the house his night- are the performances by the radiant and gifted Rosemarie Harris and Carlo Gugino. It's only in the second act of the show that things begin to get interesting and worth your while. Conflict and drama emerge. The writing gets more interesting. The ending is heartbreaking and beautiful. But the journey there is not for everyone.

B-

Do we value a play that treats its issues and characters with so much respect that much of the attendant drama leaks out? That seems to be the central question affecting the reviews of How the World Began. Adam Feldman and Michael Feingold both praise the play for its sensitivity, with Feldman saying that it plays like Oleanna set in the real world, and Feingold calling it a welcome break from the sensationalism that surrounds us. But most other critics could have used a bit more sensationalism-or, really, any sensation at all- and feel that despite the hot-button issues of atheism, creationism and education, How the World Began never really amounts to much.

B+

Much has been made about director Diane Paulus's reinventing of Porgy and Bess, ever since a certain musical theater composer slammed her in The New York Times. It turns out, according to most critics, that the changes made—some additional dialogue, the loss of Porgy's goat cart—don't seem all that radical, after all. The biggest problem most critics have is with the changes to the music. Not surprisingly, critics generally love Audra McDonald, with only WSJ's Terry Teachout and Backstage's Erik Haagensen unconvinced by her Bess (both prefer Norm Lewis's Porgy). Indeed, most critics think the show is worth seeing for the performances alone, even if they are more mixed on the design elements and overall success of the piece.

D

The critical consensus couldn't be clearer: An unbearable level of whimsy and implausibility weighs down Molly Smith Metzler's script to unsalvageable depths. While everyone is universal in praising the acting, particularly David Hyde Pierce's performance as a distant father and cutting book editor, they just feel the play doesn't work.

C+

So it turns out that in the late 90s, Michael Morpurgo wrote a sequel- or perhaps an extended epilogue- to his children's novel War Horse, which forms the basis of both the Lincoln Center Theater's smash hit and the forthcoming (unless you read this after Christmas, in which case it's currently running) Spielberg award-bait film. That novel (Farm Boy) has now been adapted into a show of the same name. While WH was staged with millions of dollars worth of puppets, actors, folk songs, dialects, projections and pageantry, Farm Boy is just two actors reminiscing while leaning against a tractor and runs less than half of the running time of War Horse. "You could worse than..." says Elisabeth Vincentelli, summing up most of the feeling about this show. Perhaps the most interesting thing about it is that it's production strategy is the exact opposite of War Horse's. Critics are tepid as to the results.

C+

Lysistrata Jones has moved on up from a scrappy downtown production staged in a real-life gym to the Walter Kerr Theater on Broadway, and critics are as hotly divided as two rival sports teams. On the plus side, reviewers like Ben Brantley find the musical a bit of delicious fluff and a sweet, upbeat tonic to combat the winter blues. Naysayers—many who enjoyed the show in its Off Broadway incarnation—say the show is not substantial enough, either in terms of size or content, to fill the Kerr or justify the triple-digit ticket price. Several critics (most notably Linda Winer at Newsday) are flat-out offended that in times like these someone would take an anti-war satire like Lysistrata and turn it into a dopey musical about college basketball.