Grace at Northlight Theatre

Chicago Tribune - Recommended

"...Directed in tense and tightly focused fashion by Dexter Bullard, this is a tense and tightly focused play with much to say about the limitations of certitude -- and the dangers of letting belief or aspirations trump firm, factual knowledge based on verifiable data."

Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended

"...This is a darkly comic, eerily tragic, wholly timely play. It dives headfirst into questions of faith and religion (not necessarily the same thing at all). It explores the nature of those often deeply painful partners: love and change. And it leads us into the realms of time and space through the use of purely poetic language."

Pioneer Press - Recommended

"...it's a good script receiving an excellent production at the Northlight, directed by Dexter Bullard. While the Northlight has had many fine shows over the past two years, "Grace" stands out as the most intellectually provocative -- and it's certainly the most disquieting play the theater has presented in a while, with enough humor to keep it from getting too oppressively dark."

Chicago Reader - Somewhat Recommended

"...Though Craig Wright's play begins and ends with a gunshot and continually circles around issues of life and death, it gets bogged down by too many theatrical devices--time sometimes travels backward--and the plot implodes. Director Dexter Bullard keeps the story from getting confusing, but the play still has a contrived showiness. When Wright forgets the pyrotechnics and lets the characters try to articulate their beliefs to one another, however, it's both interesting and moving."

Windy City Times - Somewhat Recommended

"...Intensely focused characterizations and meticulously-crafted phrasing keep us engaged while lending shape to a thesis rendered unnecessarily nebulous by its presenter’s propensity for getting in his own way."

Time Out Chicago - Recommended

"...Of the four superb actors, tautly directed by Bullard, Shannon never does less than rivet our attention....[playwright] Wright makes genuinely thought-provoking observations about fundamentalists' staunch belief not only in God, but in a God that's just rational.."

ChicagoCritic - Highly Recommended

"...Grace unfolds with biting humor, exaggerated pokes at religious zealots with seamless plotting that builds up the non-believers to wonder if there is indeed something out there while the believers question their faith as their world crashes. Wright presents a dark riddle where the characters become enmeshed in a life-death struggle that challenges the nature of real faith."

Chicago Stage and Screen - Somewhat Recommended

"...Steve Key's Steve is believably deluded by his faith, and lovely Chaon Cross is quietly mesmerizing as his lonely wife Sara. Michael Shannon shows Sam's rage and vulnerability in a nicely modulated and sympathetic performance. And the one and only Mike Nussbaum finds kernels of wit and wisdom as the elderly exterminator Karl. Even the work of these fine artists cannot completely redeem this perplexing puzzle of a play. But they give it a courageous try."