Has your pet changed your life? Have you ever wondered what she's thinking when she stares up at you and tilts her head? Could she have the secret to understanding the world at large and your place in it? Or is she just more interested in how your shoe tastes? The world of a middle-aged New York couple is turned topsy-turvy when the husband brings home an exceptionally engaging canine running loose in Central Park in the hilarious and heartwarming comedy, SYLVIA. This wonderful look into the complexities of love and commitment asks what it truly means to be devoted to your partner... and how do you choose between the love of your life and man's best friend
SYLVIA will star two-time Tony winner ANNALEIGH ASHFORD as Sylvia, Tony Award winner JULIE WHITE as Kate, and Drama Desk Award winner ROBERT SELLA as Tom/Phyllis/Leslie.
No, this not a reinvented version of CAROUSEL that's opened at the Cort, but the first Broadway production of A.R. Gurney's clever and off-beat 1995 comedy, Sylvia. On the surface, the play is about a married man in Manhattan who bonds with a stray dog in Central Park who has a tag around her neck saying Sylvia, and takes her home, much to the consternation of his wife. As scripted, Sylvia is played by a woman dressed in normal clothing that merely suggests her identity as a dog. And while the play is a breezy, hip and sentimental comedy, there's always the visual subtext of a young woman happily and unconditionally fawning over the older man who keeps her at the end of a leash.
Ashford is no one-trick canine, but those now-signature performance quirks...lend themselves to the spontaneous, indecisive, and rambling nature of Sylvia, whom Ashford plays with thoughtfulness and teenage vacuity somewhere between Snoopy and Kesha. With director Daniel Sullivan's license, Ashford is spry and spasmodic in channeling the animal's feral energy. Eventually, the physical half of the big 'joke' -- that is, human playing dog in earnest -- wears thin, but Ashford rescues herself from her own plateaus with bursts of sudden enthusiasm...Broderick gives the same pathos-less performance he's been offering since 2012's Nice Work If You Can Get It, a sleepy stroll that fits with Greg's stubborn, oblivious, and altogether aggravating lack of awareness...Even to the most pessimistic, Sylvia is innocuous and zippy, surprisingly foul-mouthed, and perhaps the very definition of disarmingly funny.
1995 | Off-Broadway |
Off-Broadway |
2015 | Broadway |
Broadway Revival Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2016 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Annaleigh Ashford |
2016 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play | Robert Sella |
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