The Arsonists Reviews

Stage and Cinema- Recommended

"...Gottlieb Biedermann tells his wife and his maid that even if he had three spare beds standing empty, taking in a stranger would still be out of the question. He says this in one breath. In the next, he offers the stranger his attic. That gap, between the rule he states and the door he opens, is the actual subject of Max Frisch’s play, first staged in 1958. It runs now in Alastair Beaton’s translation at the Skylight Theatre, directed by Luke Harlan: the fear of being rude to a man drinking your wine, and how far that fear lets a house burn."

Stage Scene LA- Highly Recommended

"...Max Frisch’s 1950s absurdist gem The Arsonists gets a strikingly staged and marvelously performed 21st-century update at the Skylight Theatre that welcomes to the L.A. theater scene an exciting new collective appropriately called The Firebugs."

Stage Raw- Recommended

"...Luke Harlan directs an impressive production for a producing company named The Firebugs at The Skylight Theatre. The show is meticulously executed in style and tone by a very strong company of actors and designers. It’s only 90 minutes, and yet I did find myself tapping my toes for about 10 of them, the final ten, by which time the play had made its point, and made its point, and made its point again, just in case you didn’t get it the first two times around."

Larchmont Buzz- Somewhat Recommended

"...The play, written in the immediate postwar era, centers on a wealthy couple, Gottlieb Bierdermann (Brian Wallace) and his wife Babette (Tessa Auberjonois). He’s concerned about the rise in local arson fires, noting that they tend to be started in attics…then proceeds to move two strangers, William Eisenring (Liam Rhodes) and Josef Schmitz (Trevor Jonathan Lown), into his own attic. The Biedermann maid Anna (Jazelle Villanueva) is kept busy carrying for her employers and their ill-intentioned guests."