Los Angeles Times - Recommended

"...Yet director Sean Branney, who won a Los Angeles Drama Critics’ Award for his direction of last season’s “The Crucible,” largely redresses that pitfall by emphasizing the comical in a surprisingly rollicking staging. And if all that high energy occasionally verges on the manic, the production nonetheless scores high points as a richly cogent entertainment that honors every syllable of the Bard’s text."
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LA Weekly - Recommended

"...By bathing the play in rich good humor, Branney ensures the last scene is a festive celebration of the restoration of order in a disordered world. Designer Arthur McBride provides the handsomely symmetrical set."
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Stage and Cinema - Somewhat Recommended

"...It’s no simple task to make comedy from chestnuts, to inform that comedy with tragic elements, or to stage a big dance in the middle of it all. That any Merchant is even watchable is a great success, and Branney’s certainly is watchable. It’s just not very consistent; but then, neither is the writing. Even Shakespeare couldn’t get everything right."
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BlogCritics.org - Recommended

"...This technique proves mostly effective, as there is a great deal of comedy in the piece and the cast is up to the task. It’s only when the tale of the merchant and moneylender comes back for another installment that the production lurches toward the melodramatic. But if one can roll with the shifts in tone, there is much to enjoy in this staging."
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World Socialist - Recommended

"...The company, under the deft direction of Sean Branney, brings out the youth and humor of the material in ways that, without the gimmicks of “concept staging” (setting Elizabethan dramas in Victorian England, 1950s Manhattan, or today’s Las Vegas, etc.), give the play a remarkably contemporary feel."
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