From one of America's most acclaimed playwrights, 4-time Tony Award winner Terrence McNally comes Mothers and Sons, a powerful new Broadway play that explores the truths of who we are and who we love.
Tony and Emmy Award-winner Tyne Daly stars in Mothers and Sons, a play about a mother who pays a surprise visit to the New York apartment of her late son's ex-partner, who is now married to another man and has a young son. Challenged to face how society has changed around her - without her - she is finally able to see the rich life her son might have led. Strikingly timely and deeply compassionate, Mothers and Sons is about the evolving definition of family and the healing power of forgiveness.
A clunker of a Broadway show, 'Mothers and Sons' asks us to endure the vacuous chit-chat of deeply unpleasant people. The worst part is, there isn't even a good reason for their chit-chatting in the first place. Fortunately, one of them is played by Tyne Daly, who gives the character of Katharine Gerard -- the embittered mother of a dead gay son -- the complexity and dignity playwright Terrence McNally refuses her...Under Sheryl Kaller's stilted direction, all three adults look uncomfortable, though at least Daly's character is meant to be that way. The actress suggests a world of pain, grief and anger behind the stoic, matronly facade, and she lands her zingers with ease. A lot more sympathetic onstage than on the page, Katharine ends up owning the show. Andre would have been proud.
Directed by Sheryl Kaller, the play has a rather clumsy construction, with pretexts continuously popping up for characters to leave the room - they answer the front door, go to the bathroom, give Bud his bath - so that the remaining pair can have their private conversations. 'Mothers and Sons,' which runs just 90 minutes, is best experienced as a kind of marker in social history, an expression of pride in progress, dignity and growing power.
2014 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2014 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Actress in a Play | Tyne Daly |
2014 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Tyne Daly |
2014 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Production of a Broadway or Off-Broadway Play | Mothers and Sons |
2014 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Actress in a Play | Tyne Daly |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play | Tyne Daly |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Susan Dietz |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Jack Thomas |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Peter Stern |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Tom Smedes |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Sanford Robertson |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Brunish-Trinchero |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Roberta Pereira |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Ed Filipowski |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Mark Lee |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Lams Production |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Ken Davenport |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Paul Boskind |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Hunter Arnold |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Loraine Alterman Boyle |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Barbara Freitag |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Debbie Bisno |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Paula Wagner |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Roy Furman |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Tom Kirdahy |
2014 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Terrence McNally |
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