Chicago Tribune - Recommended
"...This is often funny material and many in the opening-night audience had a blast, clearly happy with being given permission to enjoy a rollicking show about outlaws with so many references to identity politics. Too many, in my view. This show busts stereotypes by being itself; we get it and we like it. It does not need to keep telling us about the virtue of what it is doing."
Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended
"...Winter and Yee do the heavy lifting musically and dramatically, but they're joined by a cast that knows how to get the most out of their material. As Charlie's straight-laced brother Peter, Rammel Chan's comic gifts get a stellar showcase. So do those of Mary Williamson as Peter's law enforcement officer partner Feinberg, a karaoke queen who gifts the audience with that unforgettable rendition of "Streets of Laredo.""
Chicago Reader - Recommended
"...Part concert, part family drama, part thriller, this new play is wacky, earnest, hilarious, and harmonious as it tracks the post-shotgun wedding hijinks of Charlie and Lucy (Aurora Adachi-Winter), wherein two “first-generation Asian American renegades” rapidly jump the line from petty crime to felony when they rob a gas station convenience store with a toy gun—and become minor celebrities when the video goes viral. Now Lucy and Charlie, who have already not become doctors like every other Confucius-respecting Asian American, are on the lam, taking a classic American road trip through the midwest and singing their faces off about it."
Let's Play Theatrical Reviews - Recommended
"...The stage resembles an antique store filled with clothing, and household items, with Asian products placed on stage and as part of the stage's outer flooring, including a band area. And the band's performance of the original country western and folk songs was excellent. Yee's central vision was to make something fun and cool based all of the characters around his family members. He wanted the audience to see them as folk heroes using Asian characters. Dehnert describes Lucy and Charlie's Honeymoon as a concert with a story filled with mystery, suspense, and surprises. Let yourself get into this play's energy, as it is a delightful production that will have you laughing all day."
Around The Town Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...Under the exquisite direction of Amanda Dehnert on a stage designed by Yu Shibagaki, resembling a wall of items that never were sold in a major garage sale, lining the walls, we get to sing along as we meet the characters that tell this amazing and fun story. Charlie is played by Yee himself, and he is very at ease in this role of the "cowboy" . His partner/lover/wife, Lucy is played to perfection by Aurora Adachi-Winter. Together they are terrific and we, the audience, can feel the magic between them."
WTTW - Somewhat Recommended
"...Frankly, while the score of the show is first-rate, and the actor/singer/musicians in the nine-person cast are clearly multi-talented, I found its overall hard-edged satire off-putting in many ways. But as it happened, I was seated next to one of the show's understudies who admitted that while my response was understandable, it could be perceived in another way."
Chicago Theatre Review - Highly Recommended
"...Lucy and Charlie's Honeymoon is the story of two Asian American self-styled "renegades." Bucking the high expectations of their families, they met at a dive bar a week ago and decided to get married. Now they need an equally impromptu honeymoon, starting with knocking over a gas station to get the money for one. Comic hijinks, of course, ensue."
Chicagoland Musical Theatre - Highly Recommended
"...If your summer needs a few glugs of Tabasco with that tall glass of lemonade, Lookingglass’s world-premiere production of Lucy and Charlie’s Honeymoon has got your spice, because, boy howdy, Matthew C. Yee’s full-throttle shoot-’em-up farce is chock full of tang."
Chicago On Stage - Highly Recommended
"...The glorious silliness of all of this, played out on a beautifully eclectic Yu Shibagaki set, would feel at home in a farce, but Yee has something else in mind. In a restroom at a gas station, Lucy runs into a fellow Chinese immigrant named Bao (Harmony Zhang) and quickly recognizes that the woman is being trafficked and her trafficker (Matt Bittner) is in the men's room with Charlie."
PicksInSix - Recommended
"...Satire is a much-missed tool in our world these days. We are so afraid, it seems, to examine issues from a humorous standpoint for fear of offending someone. The latest offering at Lookingglass Theatre Company, the world premiere of “Lucy and Charlie’s Honeymoon,” seeks in no uncertain terms to conquer such fears. With a bold concept to play with – bringing a suggestion of a concert stage to a theatrical narrative – the play’s creator and Lookingglass ensemble member Matthew C. Yee (who plays Charlie and also a pretty mean guitar) has presented to the audience a kind of amalgam of styles and targets. And it works to a point."
Splash Magazine - Highly Recommended
"...How would you sum up this one of a kind theater experience? It is an experience that is equal parts intimate, moving and downright funny. Lucy and Charlie’s Honeymoon is not your typical musical – it is more like a concert that takes you on a journey across the Midwest with two First Generation Asian American Renegades in love and on the run. Direct from his Broadway debut in Almost Famous The Musical, Matthew C. Yee’s quirky, quintessentially American yarn follows a young couple fleeing expectation and trawling up trouble along the way, while embracing the worst of the American Dream!"
NewCity Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...“Lucy and Charlie’s Honeymoon,” presented by Lookingglass Theatre, is the story of two first-generation Asian American renegades on a spree of crime and passion through the backroads of the Midwest. I know what you’re thinking, “Sure, we’ve seen this before.” But have you seen it with the couple being pursued by a bloodthirsty human trafficker and his milksop lackey, and a gung-ho, pistol-wielding grandma and her burnout son close behind?"
