Academy Award nominee Adam Driver (BlacKkKlansman, Star Wars, "Girls") and Golden Globe winner Keri Russell ("The Americans," Waitress, "Felicity") star in the acclaimed drama by Pulitzer Prize winner Lanford Wilson.
When a mysterious death brings together two unlikely strangers, their explosive connection sparks a chemistry too fiery to ignore. Directed by Tony winner Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening, Hedwig and the Angry Inch), and co-starring Tony nominees David Furr and Brandon Uranowitz, BURN THIS is a smoldering story of love and raw attraction by one of the most vital playwrights of the modern era.
But Driver keeps the show aloft. Turns out Kylo Ren is immensely compelling onstage - a genuine weirdo in the hulking, strangely graceful body of a former Marine, unafraid of huge, ugly displays of emotion, blazing through Pale's aggrieved, hilarious, F-word-peppered rants with the dexterity of a dancer like Robbie. At one point, he gently puts his hand on Russell's breastbone, and it's genuinely unsettling how much of her tiny torso his big human paw covers. He's an unstoppable force and an immovable object. And he's funny as heck. Whether he's steaming over the injustices of the world - 'Half my fuckin' adult life, I swear to Christ, has been spent looking for a place to park!' - or padding around the room wearing one of Anna's little happi coats, struggling to get his enormous limbs through the weird double armholes, Driver's got a keen sense for comedy of multiple sizes, from the subtle background lazzo to the over-the-top tirade. It's fun to watch him interact with Uranowitz's wonderfully wry Larry - who can't help smiling, as if from behind his hand, at such a splattery, honest display of personality - and with Furr's Burton, who's sympathetic despite his many blind spots, and who really doesn't mean to bust out his aikido training on Pale. Pale just has a way of ... bringing things out in people.
In director Michael Mayer's kinetic, consistently engaging production, though, it really is a piece for quatre: David Furr, as Anna's swaggering screenwriter boyfriend, Burton, and Brandon Uranowitz, as her wisecracking roommate Larry, aren't just foils; they're fully formed humans who may not be part of the story's central romance (or at least not on the winning end of the equation), but who consistently give the almost pathologically intense deux at its center light and air.
1987 | Off-Broadway |
Off-Broadway |
1987 | Broadway |
Broadway |
2002 | Off-Broadway |
Off-Broadway |
2019 | Broadway |
Broadway Revival Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2019 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play | Brandon Uranowitz |
2019 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Adam Driver |
2019 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Broadway or Off-Broadway Play | Burn This |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play | Brandon Uranowitz |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play | Adam Driver |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Revival of a Play | Burn This |
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