Chicago Tribune - Highly Recommended
"...The excellence of this production is a reminder of what Gash can do as a director. He's not well known in Chicago, although I remember watching quite a lot of his work some 20 or 25 years ago at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. This is a beautifully staged show - only the very last, rushed moment doesn't quite work - that is brilliantly cast, excitingly staged and filled with the heart that comes from age. Worth 95 minutes of your time, friends."
Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended
"...Coming-of-age stories have been around almost as long as humans have been coming of age. But with “Choir Boy,” playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney takes a familiar genre and turns it into a 100-minute emotional rollercoaster, every devastating dip and giddy rise delivered through a filter of a cappella music that takes the audience from glory to despair and back."
Daily Herald - Highly Recommended
"...Under Kent Gash, who helms Steppenwolf Theatre's superbly staged revival, the scene depicting the fictional Charles R. Drew Prep School for Boys choir so engaged it was transcendent."
Chicago Reader - Highly Recommended
"...McCraney's script is sharp and poignant, allowing the cast to flourish in their respective roles as their characters bare their souls to the audience. While every Choir Boy actor shines fully in his own right, a standout performance comes from Sheldon D. Brown, who plays AJ, Pharus's roommate. Thanks to Brown's portrayal, AJ becomes a rock not just for Pharus, but for the entire audience as he demonstrates the invaluable nature of empathy and humor."
Around The Town Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...I understand the difficulty of a person not knowing exactly where he fits in. Often the family has advised of their expectations as has their school counselor. But what if he is confused? In “Choir Boy” written by Tarell Alvin McCraney, we have a story that takes place at a prep school for boys. This particular school, the Charles R. Drew Prep School for Boys is committed to building strong and ethical Black men. The play does focus primarily on Pharus ( played to perfection by Tyler Hardwick, making his Steppenwolf debut). Pharus ( pronounced “Ferris”) is a singer and has worked his way up the ladder to be the Choir leader for his senior year. This is the highest honor he can bring to his family."
Chicago Theatre Review - Highly Recommended
"...Not often do I say a show is a must-see, but Tarell Alvin McCraney's Choir Boy most definitely is. The cast, set, music, and message all combine for a truly invigorating coming-of-age show that thoughtfully portrays the struggles of a young gay Black man trying to find acceptance from his peers. The production stars La Shawn Banks, Sheldon D. Brown, Richard David, William Dick, Gilbert Domally, Tyler Hardwick, and Samuel B. Jackson, all directed by Kent Gash."
Buzznews.net - Highly Recommended
"...Not every story about gay youth is a “coming out” story. Some youth have nothing to come out of. Their lives are not spent hiding who they are. For the most part, young people today are confident and proud of who they are. They are who they are, and the world will have to deal with it. “Choir Boy,” receiving a visually and audibly beautiful staging at the Steppenwolf Theatre is the story of one such boy."
Chicagoland Musical Theatre - Highly Recommended
"...The intimate world of McCraney's Choir Boy is an authentic microcosm of American society at large: a society that expects far too much of those who are already given too little. A play of such substance and scope is refreshing, remarkable, and necessary. Under the stewardship of skilled actors and craftsmen, this production shines as an example of the work that this industry sorely needs more of."
Third Coast Review - Recommended
"...It’s not easy growing up as a gay Black boy. Tarell Alvin McCraney’s play Choir Boy is the story of Pharus, a high school senior at the Charles R. Drew Prep School for Boys, as he seeks meaning and clarity in his own identity and prepares for a world that he knows will not always welcome him. Kent Gash directs this splendid staging of McCraney’s Tony-nominated play at Steppenwolf Theatre. The five young men who play Pharus and his fellow students give soul-stirring performances and also sing a cappella gospel hymns, often smartly choregraphed, throughout the drama. Choir Boy is a thrilling night of theater although the script itself does not match the quality of the staging."
Chicago On Stage - Highly Recommended
"...It is a wonderful coincidence that now, during Pride month, just after an inventive musical about a gay Black man trying to find his voice (A Strange Loop) won Best Musical at the Tony Awards, Steppenwolf Theatre brings Chicago a revival of 2012's Choir Boy by Tarell Alvin McCraney: a play filled with so many spiritual songs that it may as well be a musical, also about a gay Black man (well, a boy in this case) trying to find his voice. While A Strange Loop, which I still have not seen, treats its subject in a highly imaginative and comic way, McCraney-an Oscar-winner for Moonlight screenplay, which he and Barry Jenkins adapted from McCraney's In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue-wrote Choir Boy in a much more serious and realistic vein."
Picture This Post - Recommended
"...Though we can see the train wreck ahead, from moment to moment we mainly feel the joy and high spirits of youth. These kids can sing! These kids can dance! From mournful renditions of spirituals, to high steppin' choreography as comraderie, and musical genres beyond and in between, we go the gamut of emotions through their songs and dance. If you don't hear their high notes (and baritone low notes) as a call-and-response summons, do know that many sitting around you will. These performers are charisma-powered, in this writer's opinion."
BroadwayWorld - Highly Recommended
"...With direction by Kent Gash, Steppenwolf's staging hits all the right notes. Steppenwolf ensemble member Tarell Alvin McCraney's play is is a heartwrenching and tuneful story about Pharus- a young gay Black man who relishes nothing more than his role as the choir lead at the prestigious Charles R. Drew Preparatory School. Over the course of the play, Pharus navigates that classic adolescent tension between his desire to be fully himself and his wish to be accepted among his peers. McCraney's script beautifully demonstrates this push-and-pull in a way that will universally resonate with audiences, but the story is also incredibly specific to Pharus and his classmates."
NewCity Chicago - Highly Recommended
"..."Steppenwolf Theatre Company," one person attached to the company told me recently, "doesn't do musicals. It does plays." Yet, on occasion, Steppenwolf nevertheless manages to fill its shows with music and musicianship worthy of the best musical theater. What's more, the stunning musical moments tend to be delivered a cappella. Perfectly pitched. There were the nine voices of Ladysmith Black Mambazo in the company's productions of 1992's "The Song of Jacob Zulu" that thirty years hence are still emblazoned in my musical memory. An earlier New York incarnation of playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney's "Choir Boy" was nominated for a Tony as a play. Still, among other compelling reasons to see-and not miss-the current Steppenwolf production is the power and musicianship in nine songs sung by the five young men who play the students in the choir at the Black Christian Charles R. Drew Prep School for Boys."
