American Idiot Reviews
Los Angeles Times- Somewhat Recommended
"...What I didn’t expect was to find the musical so dated. The story of three young suburban wastrels looking for a way out of the American capitalist wasteland struck me as a luxury we can’t really afford at this hinge moment in history."
Stage and Cinema- Somewhat Recommended
"...Unlike the jukebox musicals Mamma Mia and Escape to Margaritaville, which invented stories around the songs of ABBA and Jimmy Buffett, American Idiot — inspired by the eponymous 2004 rock concept album by the American punk rock band Green Day — has a book by lyricist Billie Joe Armstrong and original director Michael Meyer with about twenty lines of dialogue creating a wobbly superstructure on which to hang about 20 songs. Given that drugs play a significant role in what little plot can be discerned, the entire musical — which has been steadily produced since its premiere in Berkeley in 2009 and subsequent extended run on Broadway — feels like a drug trip. Disjointed, fleeting, intriguing, baffling, and frustratingly beautiful as well."
LA Splash- Highly Recommended
"...GREEN DAY’S AMERICAN IDIOT is an immensely artistic and inventive show – a must-see blockbuster to mark the return of the Mark Taper Theatre to Los Angeles."
Stage Scene LA- Highly Recommended
"...The Mark Taper Forum is back in business with an American Idiot revival so spectacular, the sex-drugs-and-rock-and-roll-packed musical extravaganza ought to follow in the footsteps of Deaf West’s Big River and Spring Awakening and become a Broadway must-see."
Stage Raw- Somewhat Recommended
"...The show is inherently overwhelming, more so in this staging, as most of the characters appear twice onstage, with their main actors and the performers playing their voices and shadows. Unfortunately, Desai mostly fails or, or perhaps intentionally declines to direct the audience's focus. The Voices (actors who speak for the deaf performers) are inconsistently lit; Milo Manheim, who along with his counterpart Daniel Durant, is one of the most objectively famous actors in the show (he was in the Disney Channel Zombies movies and was on Dancing with the Stars) is almost always illuminated when he's onstage, but he'll often be next to Will and Tunny's voices, and those two will be unlit, even though all three are singing, which ends up feeling more like a commentary on Manheim's fame rather than a dramaturgical choice."
Ticket Holders LA- Recommended
"...A lot of the praise must be heaped on choreographer Jennifer Weber, who impressively showcases the worldclass troupe of dancers—half of whom are deaf, mind you—and David O, who leads a knockout rock orchestra that could play any arena in the civilized world."
Broadway World- Somewhat Recommended
"...In Desai's staging, there has been little effort at reconsidering this story and giving this AMERICAN IDIOT anything relevant to say to (or about) a Deaf audience. The feelings of disaffection, malaise, anger or jubilation experienced by Johnny, Will and Tunny seem to be universal feelings and have nothing to do with any of these dudes being, say, outsiders. Well and good. That's how co-writers Billie Joe Armstong and Michael Mayer wrote these characters in the first place. The play's inspiration was, of course, the themes of Green Day's 2004 album which, two decades later feels as poignant and immediate as it did during its angry heyday."