Synopses & Reviews
Set on September 12, 2001,
The Mercy Seat continues Neil LaButes unflinching fascination with the often-brutal realities of the war between the sexes. In a time of national tragedy, the world changes overnight. A man and a woman explore the choices now available to them in an existence different from the one they had lived just the day before. Can one be opportunistic in a time of universal selflessness?
Review
"There is no playwright on the planet these days who is writing better than Neil LaBute....The Mercy Seat is...the work of a master." John Lahr, The New Yorker
Review
"An intelligent and thought-provoking drama that casts a less-than-glowing light on man's dark side in the face of disaster....The play's energy lies in LaBute's trademark scathing dialogue." Robert Dominguez, New York Daily News
Review
"Though set in the cold, gray light of morning in a downtown loft with inescapable views of the vacuum left by the twin towers, The Mercy Seat really occurs in one of those feverish nights of the soul in which men and women lock in vicious sexual combat, as in Strindberg's Dance of Death and Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" Ben Brantley, The New York Times
Review
"Uncomfortable yet fascinating....The Mercy Seat makes for provocative theater sharp, compelling and more than a little chilling." Michael Kuchwara, Newsday
Review
"In The Mercy Seat...LaBute has given us his most compelling portrait of male inner turmoil." Brendan Lemon, The Financial Times (U.K.)
Review
"The sharply funny and incisive Seat is not a response to September 11, but a response to the response to September 11 an emotionally jarring consideration of the self-serving exploitation of tragedy for personal gain....Perhaps it's time we stop thinking of LaBute as a mere provocateur, a label that condescends to an artist of grand ambition and a nimble facility with language. With this gripping...new drama, he probes deeper than he ever has before." Jason Zimonan, TimeOut New York
Synopsis
Set on September 12, 2001, The Mercy Seat continues Neil LaBute's unflinching fascination with the often-brutal realities of the war between the sexes. In a time of national tragedy, the world changes overnight. A man and a woman explore the choices now available to them in an existence different from the one they had lived just the day before. Can one be opportunistic in a time of universal selflessness?
About the Author
Neil LaBute is a critically acclaimed writer-director for both the stage and the screen. His controversial and much discussed works include the plays The Distance from Here and bash: latterday plays; and the films In the Company of Men, Your Friends and Neighbors, Nurse Betty, and Possession, as well as the play and film adaptation of The Shape of Things.