 Every
character, right down to the tailor and the haberdasher, has a
strong comic personality . . . making Baptista a woman, not a
man, in this version is inspired since the part goes to Vicki
Hirsch, who has wondrous ways of making a character ridiculous
but not silly. And giving Joseph Small the part of the
widow is no less astute, for much the same reason. John
McCarthy, Phillip Douglas and Jon Fordham make the three
[suitors] such lovable provincial oddballs that you are sorry
to leave them when the play ends. Renée Bucciarelli lets
one see, and feel, that Kate’s eventual surrender to Petruchio
[Michael Oberlander] is the surest sign of her intelligence—no
mean feat of acting. The play depends on the tone set by
these two, and they get it right.
D.J.R. Bruckner,
The New York Times
[John]
Flaherty, [John] McCarthy, and [Jon] Fordham all glide
smoothly in and out of their disguises. [Michael]
Oberlander shapes and reshapes the various elements of his
roles into a consistently bawdy and likable fellow. Katherine
is never anyone but herself. [Renée] Bucciarelli . . .
expertly creates a ‘modern’ woman who is trapped in the 16th
century. [Liz] Shipman brings . . . [Shakespeare] to life
intriguingly and seamlessly.
Paulanne
Simmons, The Brooklyn Paper
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