David Adjmi

Cast Requirements

5 men
3 Women
1 Child
(with doubling)

Publisher

TheatreForum (summer 2013), Theatre Communications Group (trade paperback, upcoming 2014)

Press

"David Adjmi’s pivotal work... he resembles artists as diverse as Luis Bunuel and Rainer Werner Fassbinder... Adjmi’s brilliance is to use trashy vernacular speech to allude to the way history trashes us."
Hilton Als, The New Yorker

"From Valley Girl comedy to mad-scene finale, Marin Ireland nails the Queen of France in David Adjmi’s marvelous, disturbing, revisionist take." (Critics’ Pick)
Jesse Green, New York Magazine

"David Adjmi’s jagged yet elegant historical riff... This tough-minded play doesn’t offer a middle path... Adjmi complicates the satire by imbuing his doomed protagonist with intellectual vibrancy and genuine compassion..." (Four Stars, Critic's Pick)
David Cote, Time Out

"A haunting paean to the murder of the mistress of the 1%"
(Editor's PIck)
Flavorpill

"Audacious and stunning"
Frank Rizzo, Variety

"...unique, brilliant... one of those all too rare shows in which the author, the director, the actors, and the designers are all on the same beautifully written page."
Michael Portantiere, Talkin' Broadway

"Adjmi's affecting and erudite play...a strong platform for a writer and actress whose skills may yet prove them worthy of legend."
Jon Magril, Slant Magazine

"Amazing. A must-see."
Connecticut Post

"Mr. Adjmi has set himself the task of translating this gilded-cage life into the contemporary language of the spoiled and empty-headed rich... He does so with the empathy that has always leavened his politically judgmental plays. Mr. Adjmi is one of several adventurous young playwrights now...who rather than avoiding clichés are embracing them to find out what enduring truths and lies still lurk beneath their threadbare exteriors."
Ben Brantley, New York Times

"Visually stunning, comically inspired and politically pointed, it's one of the most theatrically invigorating shows I've seen in ages" Hartford Courant

"A sobering look at how our leaders fail us, and how they internalize their own political misgivings. By the time our title queen reaches her bitter end, you may be surprised by how quietly moving the journey has become...This vivid reimaging of ''Madame Deficit'' falls squarely in the black."
Jason Clark, Entertainment Weekly

"In Adjmi's work, even the most innocent-seeming sweetmeats have bitter fillings—brutality, acid, blood... Macarons cede to just deserts, gowns to rags, quips to insane ramblings, gilded dream to caustic nightmare. And still the degradation continues. We are powerless to stop the violence, and what we may have once desired we now deplore. Or, Adjmi asks, do we?"
Alexis Soloski, Village Voice

"Weeks after seeing it, I still haven’t been able to get David Adjmi’s stunning play, “Marie Antoinette,” out of my head. It’s my best theatrical experience of the year so far"
David Noh, Gay City News

“High art on all levels, from coarse to cosmic… takes an old joke about an insensitive ruer and extends it into a frantically entertaining, fierce, and fresh social satire. Revolutionary.” Chris Arnott, New Haven Advocate

"If you call yourself a theater artist of any kind, run to 46 Walker Street before this Marie closes."
Jessica Foley, Broad Street Review

Production and Development History

Workshops: Jaw West Festival/Portland Center Stage (2007); Goodman Theatre New Stages Series (2008); Soho Rep W/D Series (2006); Sundance Institute Theatre Lab Residency at the The Public Theater (2007).

Productions: World Premiere co-production: A.R.T./Harvard and Yale Repertory Theatre (2012); NY Premiere: Soho Rep (2013). Upcoming in 2014/15: Středočeské Theatre, Woolly Mammoth Theatre, Stages Theatre (Houston), Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Feinstein-Gamm Theatre, Pure Theatre, Westböhmisches Theatre, Dobama Theatre, Nola Theatre