Chicago Tribune - Highly Recommended
"...There is just one Chicago actor, Michael Patrick Thornton, delivering an observational monologue for about 75 minutes. He does so on a mostly empty stage. His character, who does not tell us where he has come from - beyond intimating that it does not appear to be anywhere on planet Earth - does not even have a proper name. In the playbill, he is known as Traveler. He can, at least, take solace in the uppercase title. Such small victories are to be savored."
Chicago Sun Times - Recommended
"...For those with a literal turn of mind, a play called "Title and Deed" might suggest issues of ownership and the transfer of real estate. But while grounded in the more primal realities of man's existence, particularly the inescapable fact of his mortality, playwright Will Eno is very much a poet as opposed to a literalist. And the "property" at the center of his hourlong one-man show - now receiving its Midwest premiere at Lookingglass Theatre, where it is being performed by Michael Patrick Thornton - is nothing more or less than one man's life. The lease on that life is, by its very nature, short."
Chicago Reader - Highly Recommended
"...Positioned on a bare stage surrounded by the audience on three sides, the wheelchair-bound Thornton is given nowhere to hide by director Marti Lyons, who entirely forgoes Lookingglass Theatre Company’s trademark acrobatics. Thornton doesn’t need them—his performance is just about perfect, combining an easy geniality with traces of some unspoken heartbreak."
Windy City Times - Recommended
"...In a departure from Lookingglass's customary bells-and-whistles spectacle, Daniel Ostling's scenic and lighting design is almost painfully minimalist, with nearly half the seats in each side section roped off to spectators. This puts audiences within eye-contact proximity of the stage and one another—not unlike the configuration in the Gift Theater, Thornton's home-base storefront playhouse—creating an intimacy that allows our host to address playgoers directly ( hearing a chair scrape, he entreats its fidgety occupant, "Please don't leave yet!" ) It's a reasonable request to make of a "nice clump" of strangers providing the opportunity for a friendly chat before the sunset glow signals the dying of the light."
Time Out Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...As a longtime fan of Eno’s work, I’m well aware that his style is divisive to say the least. I find the playwright’s facility with language, his compulsion to pick apart idioms and clichés even while admiring them, as fulfilling as others find it infuriating. But in Thornton, who’s previously appeared in Eno’s Middletown at Steppenwolf and directed the shorts collection Oh the Humanity (and other exclamations) at the Gift Theatre, we get a protagonist who fully engages with Eno’s off-kilter, empathetic voice. Lamenting the life he left back home, wherever that is, while implicitly reminding us to savor our own, Thornton and his director find the humanity in this foreigner, thoroughly demonstrating how well they know Eno."
Stage and Cinema - Somewhat Recommended
"...An exercise in almost mischievous minimalism, Title and Deed is the artistic equivalent of Gertrude Stein's reduction of Oakland: "There's no there there." It's as if the Beckett-like indomitability that made Vladimir and Estragon unintentionally heroic is now an excess of assurance. In our doubt-dogged 21st century any self-assertion is constantly qualified and conditional. We've reached the point where the usual question with which we confront confessions-"Why is he telling us this?"-becomes irrelevant. This man lives through his lines and the rest really is silence."
ChicagoCritic - Recommended
"...Marti Lyons’s directing helps Thornton remain on-point instead of rambling. The tantalizing possibility that the Traveler’s monologue is going somewhere keeps us engaged for a little over an hour. But Mara Blumenfeld’s vaguely Bekettian costume design warns us not to stake our hopes on closure. Thornton is a wonder to watch and listen to, and the final sequence in which the Traveler directly comments on what is bothering him, combined with staging that makes Daniel Ostling’s lights seem to close off his world, is deeply affecting. Whether that’s enough to justify the previous hour depends on your patience. I found Eno’s jokes amusing, and considered the Traveler’s one-sided banter to be as much a part of baring his soul as recounting the big moments in his life. But I can see how another person could get irritated with his moping. Despite whatever one thinks of the script, however, Title and Deed is a chance to see a master actor at his art."
Chicago Stage and Screen - Highly Recommended
"...Thornton is a disabled actor, and is in a wheelchair throughout the piece. The man does not move from his seat, and thus eliminates any superfluity. He gets right to your soul with just his language and his heart. As he talks about his family and past loves with great humor and massive pathos. His storytelling is so effective that, as an audience member, you feel as if he's hitting certain deep emotional pressure points. He unveils certain societal truths with such ruthless empathy that you cannot help but see yourself in them."
Around The Town Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...Lookingglass Theatre Company is known for their creativity and style as they present inventive, collaborative and transformative works to their stage on Michigan Avenue. Their current production, "Title and deed", written by Will Eno, in its Midwest Premiere, truly fits this description. Directed by Marti Lyons, this one man show, featuring the perfect actor, Michael Patrick Thornton, in the role of "everyman" (as I saw it), an alleged "visitor", albeit human, and not some alien, who sees our world from a unique standpoint."
Chicago Theatre Review - Highly Recommended
"...Will Eno’s solo work is a thoughtful examination and exploration of language. He pokes fun at and empathizes with, like his Traveler, our desire to express ourselves with words. As our tour guide through Eno’s wonderland of conversations and conundrums, the talented Michael Patrick Thornton is superb. At one point, Mr. Thornton is discussing food. He suddenly stops and says, “I’m sorry, but I don’t sense much joy here.” But he’s wrong. Through Mr. Thornton’s heartbreaking, yet easygoing and warmly comic performance, there is a great deal of joy among his listeners."
