Harlequino: On to Freedom Reviews
Los Angeles Times- Recommended
"...The show's equally important objective, however, is to channel that tradition's anti-authoritarian spirit into contemporary social critique. Linking the concurrent emergence of commedia with the growing African slave trade during the early 1500s, the play explores the nature of Harlequino's servitude through a racial lens. (The show's subtitle invokes the mounting defiance of the enslaved.)"
Hollywood Progressive- Recommended
"...Set circa 1530 in Italy, The Actors' Gang's Harlequino: On to Freedom takes place when commedia dell'arte emerged as an important form of theater. Cihan Sahin's projections of the era's artwork, Olivia Courtin's costumes and original music composed by writer/director Tim Robbins, sung by the company and performed by a live band (with Ara Dabanjian on mandolin), conjure up 16th century Europe during what was called the "Counter-Reformation", when traditionalists rejected Protestant changes advocated 500 years ago by Martin Luther and his acolytes."
Culver City Crossroads- Highly Recommended
"...Theater is the space that shows us how the artifice of 'make believe' reflects our reality in all it's hard and brilliant facets. Harlequino: On to Freedom is a clean cut jewel."
Capital And Main- Recommended
"...Writer/director Tim Robbins' Harlequino: On to Freedom at the Actors' Gang is a messy, boisterous show that runs nearly two and a half hours before the message it wants to deliver about personal freedom and self-determination comes through simply and clearly. Along the way, however, it features first-class talent, colorful spectacle and enough historical detail about commedia dell' arte to keep audiences entertained and involved. And oh, yes - it's bound together by a raucous disdain for the status quo that this company is famous for. In these days, we can use as much of that kind of theatrical subversion as we can get."
Ticket Holders LA- Recommended
"...Although there's plenty of raucous sexual insinuation and the tale has its share of B-plotted star-crossed lovers, what Robbins goes for under the deliciously over-the-top stylistic foolishness, lurking just below the comedic surface is the suggestion that there was a link between the emergence of Commedia and the growing slave trade in Europe during that era. Harlequino: On to Freedom presents a clear heralding call for equality just as today we're being so sickeningly challenged in our divided nation and throughout the world."