Chicago Tribune - Somewhat Recommended
"...Actors at Steep Theatre never mess around or shirk from depth, and there are some very intensely performed scenes by a big cast of highly accomplished actors - Sasha Smith, Nate Whelden, Lauren Sivak, Sigrid Sutter, Peter Moore, Aurora Adachi-Winter, Alex Gillmor, Jim Poole, Melissa Riemer, Eunice Woods. Entering with veracity into the craziness of 1920s Bavaria is far from easy and that was achieved here, for sure."
Windy City Times - Highly Recommended
"...The tiny Steep Theatre performance space succeeds in suggesting the bleak landscape just outside the kitchen ( which assumes the ambience of a prison cell ). Combined with the emotional intensity displayed by Brad DeFabo Akin's direction of a laser-focused cast, the suspense generated as each clue surfaces is as provocative as it is persistent."
Time Out Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...At its heart, Hinter is a story of women under threat from men, and the fact of that looming violence is never placed out of sight. But West’s commitment to paradox, to complexity, bleeds throughout the play and into the way she draws her characters, all of whom (with the exception of Andres) are complex, feisty, irritable, kind, loving, and entirely incapable of being easily resolved. Between the characters and West’s somersaulting story structure, Hinter manages to be something that only the best mystery stories can achieve: It’s one you want to watch twice."
Chicago On the Aisle - Recommended
"...What "Hinter" does not provide - and I think this is a strength - is a Hercule Poirot. There is no hero sleuth, smarter than the rest of us, to figure out what happened. I'm not telling either. I remain content to provide only a few hints about the chilling characters we meet during the course of the white-knuckle unwinding directed by Brad DeFabo Akin."
The Fourth Walsh - Recommended
"...HINTER is historical fiction. West weaves a story around an unsolved serial murder from the 1920s. Although I became distracted by some of the facts - like 'why have a maid if you can't afford food?' and 'where did you get that money?' and 'what are you doing with the corpses?', I was fully tethered to cracking this cold case. On and offstage, nervous energy was palpable. HINTER kept me twitching through the curtain call and all the way home."
Third Coast Review - Highly Recommended
"...Hinter is one of the best plays I've seen in the past year. It's incredibly impactful, with dynamic characters that don't need to tell you who they are with words. The mystery is so compelling as to make you wish there wasn't an intermission so you can find out more about what happened and why, and the set and lighting transport you to another place fully and effortlessly. It's worth your time to head to Steep Theatre and catch Hinter during its world premiere run."
The Hawk Chicago - Not Recommended
"...Overall, despite several talented artists and a compelling real-life story, Steep's world premiere of Hinter is too confounding to enjoy, and too disjointed to recommend."
NewCity Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...The play has a significant ensemble of well-defined characters, none of whom are given any more or less attention, even when the focus of the play is shifted to the soon-to-be-murdered family. In recasting the historical events with a dominantly female-identified cast, West taps into the differences between how women and men react to horror. The men desire either to solve the crime themselves for self-motivated reasons or be rid of its insistent enigma altogether. Meanwhile the women grieve with each other in a shared understanding that the dead are dead; glory is no antidote to death's finality. Bonded by mutual empathy, they are nevertheless suspicious of each other and not without reason. Secrets swirl around this small house and only some of them are supernatural."
