The Roommate
Opening Night: September 12, 2024
Theater: Booth Theatre
Website: theroommatebway.com
See Mia Farrow and Patti LuPone prove that being bad can be so much fun.
Sharon (Farrow) has never had a roommate before. But after her divorce, she needs a housemate to pay the bills. That’s when Robyn (LuPone) arrives. The Roommate by Jen Silverman is about an unexpected, life-changing friendship that’s both funny and deeply moving, between two very different middle-aged women as they navigate the complexities of identity, morality, and the dream of reinvention.
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September 12, 2024
The problem is that this version of “The Roommate,” working backward from that fact, delivers a pair of very satisfying performances that cancels out the play. You’ll remember LuPone’s sneers and Farrow’s tears — not what caused them.
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September 13, 2024
So my disappointment in the play is not due to some casualty of heart or humanity — the show’s got well-enough doses of both — but rather its missing sense of deeper purpose.
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September 12, 2024
The Roommate is not exactly the feel-good comedy of the year, but it will make you laugh and think a little harder about whom you discount in life — at your own peril. It may also make you want to give your mother a call. You never know what kind of trouble she might be getting up to.
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September 12, 2024
It wouldn’t be right to say that these scenes, at the play’s end, make you forget what came before, the jokes that didn’t land. Instead, they put them into context: She’d been playing at being a person, and now, so many hilarious scams later, she’s become one.
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September 12, 2024
And those aren’t the only flaws in this awkwardly paced, abruptly mood-shifting tale of two very different women on the verge of old age looking to outrun their pasts and stake new claims on the future. Not even the ever-reliable director Jack O’Brien can get a firm grasp on this squiggly story, but at least he doesn’t have to make the effort alone: Who wouldn’t want Farrow and LuPone on their team?
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September 12, 2024
I seriously doubt many audience members will regret their attendance at “The Roommate.” You just don’t see performances like the one delivered by Farrow, now 79, very often.
READ THE REVIEWSeptember 12, 2024
Between the two of them, you can’t really fail to enjoy an evening of theater, bumpy as the road may be at points. Farrow, especially, shines in a brisk yet moving conclusion that underscores the power of fleeting relationships to alter the trajectory or our lives. The Roommate, as with a real, solid house-sharing arrangement, is neither disastrous nor perfect. It entails moments of awkwardness and adjustment, some settling in and some compromises, to find the best of it.
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September 12, 2024
It may be given a glossy sheen and a smattering of good punch lines in The Roommate, but it sends us out into the night with the dull sensation of wondering what exactly we were clapping for.
READ THE REVIEWSeptember 12, 2024
Despite the fine efforts of the performers and solid production values including music by an overqualified David Yazbek, The Roommate, running 100 minutes without an intermission, always feels predictable despite its procession of narrative surprises designed for easy laughs. But that’s no reason not to take advantage of the unique opportunity to watch Farrow and LuPone play off each other with the expert comic timing of seasoned vaudevillians.
READ THE REVIEWSeptember 12, 2024
There are a couple twists—one involves a rather questionable Walmart purchase—that push The Roommate from realistic into far-fetched territory. One, unfortunately, is the ending. Again, no spoilers, but it’s a moment for Sharon that should be brimming with possibility, not hampered by implausibility.
READ THE REVIEWSeptember 12, 2024
LuPone knows she can get a laugh from just the quirk of an eyebrow or her delivery of any line, even somber ones. She is engaged with the audience, but not deeply with the character. It’s a performance that suggests LuPone knows she can do whatever she wants and succeed.
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September 12, 2024
A variation on odd-couple themes, the play tills land that has been farmed many times. Yet it finds freshness in the familiar through a series of small twists—and, in Farrow’s star turn, an enchanting revelation.
READ THE REVIEWSeptember 12, 2024
Ultimately, it’s a privilege just to spend a spell with icons like Farrow and LuPone, even if like their characters, they seem somewhat mismatched. When you’ve got two certified greats, it’s hard not to wish for something more than just fine.
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September 12, 2024
It is too early in the Broadway season to call something the worst. That caveat aside, “The Roommate” is the saddest spectacle of wasted talent on Broadway since Andre De Shields played a gorilla in “Prymate” in 2004.
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