Fool For Love at Steppenwolf Theatre

Chicago Tribune - Recommended

"...The show is worth seeing for Neff’s raw determination and I suspect it will deepen over time. But I wish Gehlfuss, who has much talent, would stop playing a cowboy with a rope, which he does perfectly well, and wrestle with being one instead. Then we might feel that this couple has no choice about what they are doing with and to each other and have to deal with all the implications of that on the way home."

Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended

"...This superlative production is directed by Brit Jeremy Herrin, in a Chicago debut for the ages, providing 65 minutes of theater that’s both fun and disturbing. Not only does he bring out extraordinary performances, he has aligned a design team to put us right where we should be: in the ‘80s, in a seedy motel room in the vast American Southwest of the Mojave Desert, in an expressive space that’s claustrophobic and where the sound of slamming doors lingers."

Daily Herald - Highly Recommended

"..."Fool for Love" taps into all kinds of mythical tropes, including the Old West and a shocking stumble into the realm of Greek tragedy. You can feel all of this in director Jeremy Herrin's visceral take on Shepard's 1983 drama, now being revived for the first time in four decades by Steppenwolf Theatre Company in a nod to its own mythologized origin story."

Talkin Broadway - Highly Recommended

"...Continuing its 2024-2025 season, Steppenwolf Theatre is presenting a revival of Sam Shepard's Fool for Love. Directed by Jeremy Herrin, this compressed modern classic, with its evocation of a disturbing, but necessary, lucid dream, showcases both cast and company at their best, making the case for small, urgent stories from the opposite end of Noises Off, which Steppenwolf undertook just a few short (in historical context, eternal) months ago."

Stage and Cinema - Highly Recommended

"...Romantic love is rarely easy. Even when a relationship progresses from first attraction to full commitment to picture-perfect nuptials, there are no guarantees. Since its 1983 debut in San Francisco, Sam Shepard’s hour-long one-act Fool for Love, written after a difficult divorce, has become a template for exploring love’s darker side—disappointment, distrust, and the thin line between love and hate. Despite this toxicity, and even with love tragically tainted by disappointment and distrust, an undeniable and remitting pull persists, a base and throbbing craving for that other person."

Around The Town Chicago - Highly Recommended

"...Anyone who has ever read a Sam Shepard play knows that his stories are pretty “true grit”! Steppenwolf Theatre Company is now doing a production of “Fool For Love”, his 1983 intense love story that takes place in a steamy motel room in the Mojave Desert. This is a reboot of a play thta enjoyed tremendous response back in the day, and for those who are into Shepard and his writing, they will find that even over 40 years later, it is still sharp and will leave you in awe."

WTTW - Recommended

"...It is May and Eddie who drive the show (which has been staged with high energy by English director Jeremy Herrin). And they are terrific, vocally powerful actors who also are wonderfully impressive in their physicality. Yet on some level this play really doesn't have very much to say aside from the fact that the intense interplay of a man and a woman can wreak havoc."

Chicago Theatre Review - Highly Recommended

"...Dropped into a story that already began years before, playwright Sam Shepard introduces us to a pair of lonesome lovers in the night. The couple's pain is as raw as their passion is relentless and inescapable. Although we don't know who May and Eddie are to each other from the beginning, soon theatergoers put together the puzzle pieces and figure it out. FOOL FOR LOVE, which was a finalist for the 1984 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, can be seen as a cautionary tale."

Buzz Center Stage - Highly Recommended

"...Love is often jokingly referred to as a socially acceptable form of insanity, but in Sam Shepard's 'Fool for Love' - social acceptability is an afterthought. Steppenwolf is especially known for their revivals of Shepard's plays, and under Jeremy Herrin's direction, their revival of 'Fool for Love' is as good as you can get."

The Fourth Walsh - Highly Recommended

"...In an ascending Chicago career that began in the aughts on smaller stages such as Steep Theater (where she remains a company member) and Victory Gardens (RIP), Caroline Neff has reliably been a highlight of the many plays I've seen her in over the years. Whatever the role, you always believe her. As a Steppenwolf ensemble member now and in her biggest role in the mainstage theater to date, Neff rises to the occasion. Her work feels as true and vulnerable as ever, but with a power I haven't seen before. Under the direction of Jeremy Herrin, Neff's stunning, forceful performance sets the tempo for the entire cast."

Third Coast Review - Highly Recommended

"...The script of Sam Shepard’s romantic drama Fool For Love begins with the stage direction, “This play is be performed relentlessly, without a break.” The superb actors at Steppenwolf Theatre must’ve circled that sentence, because the energy they bring to this revival, directed by Jeremy Herrin, starts at level nine and then wavers between eight and eleven for the night. Theater delivered “relentlessly” can exhaust an audience, but I was riveted moment-to-moment by the confident performances and impressed constantly by the show’s production values."

Chicago Theater and Arts - Somewhat Recommended

"...If you are interested in the history and craft of playwriting, you might find some value, but I cannot in good conscience suggest that this is where my readers or podcast listeners should invest what might be limited theater dollars. Wait for a better production here, which will undoubtably come along soon."

PicksInSix - Recommended

"...The great Sam Shepard play "Fool for Love," now playing at Steppenwolf Theatre through March 23, was written in the middle of a quality string of highly volatile, verbally explosive plays about family that he penned in an eight-year period between 1977 and 1985. including "Buried Child" (which won Mr. Shepard his Pulitzer Prize in 1979) and "True West"(which had a legendary Steppenwolf production). In 1984, "Fool for Love" was itself nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and purportedly was written after the playwright's divorce from his first wife, resulting in a outpouring of personal, emotional fallout that produced this searing piece of theatre."

MaraTapp.org - Highly Recommended

"...Fool for Love is full of surprises I won’t reveal other than to say there is a lot of shock and sadness. Hard as it is to imagine, there are also funny moments though often the humor comes more from the snap of the characters than the situation itself. The three Steppenwolf ensemble members – Chamberlain, Hopper and Neff – are all sublime in this revival of Shepard’s play and so is Gehlfuss. Jeremy Herrin’s excellent directing keeps the passions high and the fires raging throughout the 65 minutes that his cast is onstage. Todd Rosenthal’s tacky room with the neon “Motel” sign above it and trash all about is perfect, as are Raquel Adorno’s costumes from that red dress to Martin’s necktie, the hippest thing about the man."

Chicago Culture Authority - Highly Recommended

"...With a searing new production of Fool for Love starring next-generation ensemble members Cliff Chamberlain, Tim Hopper and Caroline Neff alongside TV star Nick Gehlfuss, Steppenwolf and Shepard deliver another explosive theatrical treat worth savoring."

Splash Magazine - Recommended

"...We all know a crisis has been coming, and yet it arrives in historical dialogue. When the story has been told, we are all free to understand who has left whom, and what the consequences of broken faith can wreak upon survivors, if there are any. The denouement is breathtaking; beautifully directed by Herrin, we are left in awe of the skills of the playwright, the stagecraft, and the artistry of the cast."

BroadwayWorld - Recommended

"...The real energy here lies with Neff and Gehlfuss. They supercharge May and Eddie's battles. But what seems like an initial quarrel between an abusive couple becomes part of a larger narrative of inherited trauma and unresolved feelings. Neff and Gehlfuss also suitably play those arcs. Neff is initially feisty and flighty, and Gehlfuss leads with "macho" energy. Both performers make their roles more emotionally rich and raw as the play goes on, which is befitting the increasing revelations about their undeniable and strange connection."

NewCity Chicago - Highly Recommended

"...Director Jeremy Herrin paces the action well, with no element going to waste. The aesthetic-wood-paneled walls, a jealous lover lurking in the night and tequila drank straight from the bottle-elevate the story nicely without ever eclipsing the power dynamic defining Eddie and May's relationship. Presented in Steppenwolf's more intimate downstairs theater, this is quite simply storytelling at its best. Two doomed lovers forever repeating the actions of their parents-recommend that you take it all in with a tequila back."