The House Of Bernarda Alba at Circle Theatre

Chicago Tribune - Not Recommended

"...Kristin Gehring's airless staging for Circle Theatre only occasionally suggests the great primal longing and jealousy running through the matriarch's troubled daughters. The greatest problem with this production is that Maggie Speer's Bernarda Alba never convinces us of her all-encompassing power."

Chicago Sun Times - Somewhat Recommended

"...Lorca's last play, written shortly before his death at the onset of the Spanish Civil War, is slyly political, taking a stab at those who repressed the freedoms of others. The success of any production of "Bernarda Alba" depends on the abilities of its cast to strip each woman down to her emotional bare bones. The Circle production, under the direction of Kristin Gehring, only partly succeeds in fleshing out each character."

Daily Herald - Recommended

"...Bernarda, a tyrannical matriarch is obsessed with social position and appearance, and places intolerable restrictions on her five daughters, denying them an opportunity to marry, and frustrating them sexually. They become bitter and cruel, and in the end things turn violent, then tragic."

Chicago Reader - Not Recommended

"...director Kristin Gehring ignores the script's poetic imagery and folkloric hyperbole to interpret the play as psychological realism. A less hesitant, self-conscious cast might have strengthened her case, but as it stands Lorca's tale is unconvincing. Maggie Speer's Bernarda is a lumbering mass of indiscriminate unpleasantness without a specific history to render her human."

Time Out Chicago - Recommended

"...with Lorca’s drama about a mother so bound by social dictates she’d rather cane her girls than see them shame the family, Gehring’s melodramatic stranglehold on the text is much more satisfying than a restrained hand."

ChicagoCritic - Somewhat Recommended

"...The text is spunky and engaging, sardonic and harrowing. The set by Bob Knuth Is spectacularly evocative of a plaster/adobe, rural, ceramic tile floored, ironwork windowed home in 1930s Spain. Lighting by Aimee Whitmore and sound design by Peter J. Storm beautifully complement the playwright’s evocation of a stuffy but sometimes lovely interior world. The direction by Kristin Gerhring and performances by the sizable cast bring us to a frenzied peak of anger and frustration and, with very few breaks in this pitch, keeps us there for almost two hours. And this is the challenge of this production."