You Are Cordially Invited to the End of the World! Reviews
You Are Cordially Invited to the End of the World!
Los Angeles Times- Recommended
"...The play has elements of Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" and "The Skin of Our Teeth" and echoes of contemporary plays, such as Julia Cho's "Aubergine" and Eboni Booth's "Primary Trust." Additionally, the movement from domestic mayhem to cosmic absurdity evokes the works of Paula Vogel and Sarah Ruhl, American exemplars of magic realism."
Stage and Cinema- Highly Recommended
"...The end arrives not with a sob, but with a drag queen in a glittering black pantsuit, standing in a celestial spotlight, grinning like they're about to host the universe's weirdest game show. Keiko Green's You Are Cordially Invited to the End of the World! doesn't so much begin as launch, sending up a metaphysical flare before crash-landing in a sterile doctor's office. This isn't a slow descent into darkness-it's a chaotic, shimmering freefall. The apocalypse is coming, and M, our sparkly emcee and emotional tether, is here to narrate, provoke, and make sure we don't look away at South Coast Rep."
Angeles Stage- Somewhat Recommended
"...If the characters in "Furlough's Paradise" sometimes imagine a future "paradise," those in Keiko Green's "You Are Cordially Invited to the End of the World!" (closing Saturday) foresee the opposite of paradise - a world that is dying, or at least being radically transformed, by climate change. Greg (Joel de la Fuente) decides to fight that change even as he is literally dying from his own pancreatic cancer."
Stage Raw- Recommended
"...Yes, the Earth is dying but it may take a few billion more years for its eventual demise. Greg Murphy (Joel de la Fuente), though, is not so lucky. Recently diagnosed with terminal cancer, the mild-mannered Greg is resigned to his fate, choosing to spend what quality time he has left with his loving spouse Viv (Alysia Reiner) and alienated trans fem child M (River Gallo). Still, boosted by medication-infused hallucinations and nature documentaries, Greg is convinced that his salvaging the planet from climate change will save him - and his family's - fragile world."
Nerds Of Color- Highly Recommended
"...At the core of this play is a man coming to terms with his stage four cancer while his wife and grownup child must come to terms with his unravelling mind and erratic behaviors about the end of the world. While on the surface it would seem that this play is a rather serious affair, Keiko Green infuses so much surreal and absurd comedy that you as the audience member are taken on a wild ride where we encounter a distorted version of Greta Thunberg, a green army man come to life, and a giant talking frog and rat."
Broadway World- Highly Recommended
"...Now having its World Premiere production at OC's Tony Award-winning South Coast Repertory as part of its annual Pacific Playwrights Festival, Keiko Green's quirky yet genuinely touching YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO THE END OF THE WORLD! comes off as a bold and emotionally resonant new theatrical work that many will either need to embrace with a completely open mind or be intriguingly perplexed throughout by its proud, endearing eccentricity."