Which play to see? Reviews of ‘Anything You Hear’ and ‘The Herd’
Valley theaters are taking a chance on new work, including a world premiere from a local playwright. Here are this week’s reviews in a nutshell.
Great Good Fair Bomb Bad
‘Anything You Hear’ mixes
fine job balancing laughs with genuine suspense, even though the youthful Ryan L. Jenkins is somewhat less than intimidating as the mysterious operatives’ dragon-lady boss. Most important, the climax delivers a hugely entertaining payoff. “Anything You Hear” goes out with a bang.
There’s no deep social commentary, but it’s an edge-ofyour-seat mystery with plenty of comic relief.
Reviewed Saturday, Nov. 26. Continues through Saturday, Dec. 10. Tempe Center for the Arts, 700 W. Rio Salado Parkway. $15-$30. 480-227-1766, straycattheatre.org.
‘The Herd’ takes you inside a
life-threatening physical ailments. While awaiting his arrival, long-suffering mom Carol (Maureen Dias Watson) has to deal with a highstrung daughter and her oh-by-theway boyfriend, a disabled father and busybody mother and a surprise appearance by her estranged husband, who bailed on the family when he couldn’t deal with the mental load. To his credit, the playwright doesn’t turn any of the characters into villains, yet he lets none of them off the hook for their decisions. And the acting here is excellent, from Patti Davis Suarez’s acerbic grandmother to Watson’s terrifically nuanced portrayal of a woman who has carried so much psychological weight for so long that she doesn’t know how to let go of an ounce of it.
For the audience, “The Herd” is a powerful exercise in walking in someone else’s shoes as we experience the stress, the fear and the hopeful resilience of imperfect humans dealing with the reality that, as John Lennon put it, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
Reviewed Sunday, Nov. 27. Continues through Sunday, Dec. 11. Theatre Artists Studio, 4848 E. Cactus Road, Suite 406, Phoenix. $15-$25. 602-765-0120, thestudiophx.org.