Merrily We Roll Along Reviews
Los Angeles Times- Somewhat Recommended
"...The dramatic concept is carefully worked out, but the characterizations and psychologies often seem like an afterthought. Furth, who died in 2008, is better at arranging ideas about the characters through the book's structure than he is at revealing their hearts and minds through moment-to-moment interaction. There are lulls in the show in which nothing seems to be happening but the clumsy enactment of what has already been established through the dramatic overview of the score."
Broadway World- Recommended
"...Reconciling the shifting tones of the piece isn't always easy but Arden maneuvers through the changes with forethought, alternating the shrill, shallow duplicity of fame with an inexplicable search for meaning that speaks to something deeper. It may be a lot to ask of an audience but the journey is well-worth the effort and pays off handsomely in the end."
Stage Scene LA- Highly Recommended
"...Broadway couldn't do it any better than the breathtaking revival of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth's Merrily We Roll Along now playing at Beverly Hills' Wallis Annenberg Center For The Performing Arts, not unless they too could get recent Tony nominee Michael Arden on board to direct with the same originality and flair he brought to last season's Spring Awakening or come up with a cast as spectacular as the one at the Wallis."
Gia on the Move- Highly Recommended
"...Directed by Michael Arden, what might have been a downer years ago, is now refreshed by no less than Arden's signature dynamics. The play has air. And choreographed by Eamon Foley it is physically patterned much like a dance, where the chore reveals the leading man after abandoning his love, returning to find that she is dead and he is left to wallow in his own grief."
Stage Raw- Highly Recommended
"...Merrily We Roll Along, an oft-overlooked Sondheim musical that closed after only sixteen performances in its original Broadway run in 1981, came at a low point in American musical theatre and its power over the American imagination. But with time, the show - based on a Kaufman and Hart play of the same name - has been elevated to an almost mythical status among Sondheim obsessives who see it as an overlooked gem."