The Designated Mourner presented by The Right Brain Project at SideProject Studio Theatre

Chicago Tribune - Somewhat Recommended

"...With its Costco-sized monologues, "The Designated Mourner" is the quintessential actor's challenge. The current production from Right Brain Project, under Tony Ingram's direction, meets that challenge only halfway. With a play this good, half is better than nothing."

Chicago Reader - Somewhat Recommended

"...Shawn's dense text, structured as a series of overlapping monologues, is an ambitious choice for the small, non-Equity Right Brain Project, and the actors aren't always up to the task. Only Elizabeth Bagby as Judy fully conveys the sense of being emotionally changed by the act of describing a life she's actually lived."

Time Out Chicago - Not Recommended

"...it seems unfair to fault Ingram’s actors for providing Shawn’s monotonous writing equally unvarying performances. (With the same inflections, the seated trio narrates both systematic killings and dinner debates.) Yet it does seem strange that Right Brain Project would cast this language-driven play with actors who can’t quite find the soul in what’s ultimately empty rhetoric—making more apparent that that’s, in effect, Shawn’s flaw, too."

ChicagoCritic - Recommended

"...This is a terrific vehicle for actors allowing them to use their skills to paint pictures through words and body language. Densely personal narrative together with social diatribes against the evil new government, The Designated Mourner is an intense piece that demands your full attention. The show comments on our search for meaning in a world devoid of art."