(Ben Brantley’s article reappeared in The New York Times, 8/4; via Pam Green.)
The Clubbed Thumb Summerworks’ production of “Men on Boats” played through the summer of 2015. Following are excerpts from Ben Brantley’s review, which appeared in The New York Times on June 24, 2015. The full text is here. The play opened on Monday at Playwrights Horizons’ Peter Jay Sharp Theater, 416 West 42nd Street, Manhattan; 212-279-4200, ticketcentral.com.
If summer has you hankering for fitness-testing excursions through the dangerous outdoors, you will surely want to spend time with the hearty title characters of “Men on Boats.”
The inhabitants of this rollicking history pageant by Jaclyn Backhaus are fellows who are always up for shooting the rapids, the breeze and edible wildlife. They hail from the United States of the mid-19th century, when assertive, unquestioning masculinity was something that stood tall and unchallenged.
Oh, and just so you know, there isn’t a man in the 10-member cast of “Men on Boats.” On the other hand, as we have plenty of reason to think these days, gender can be as much matter of perception as of chromosomes.