Total Rating: 
***1/2
Opened: 
January 17, 2008
Ended: 
closed
Country: 
USA
State: 
New York
City: 
New York
Theater Type: 
Broadway
Theater: 
Ethel Barrymore Theater
Theater Address: 
243 West 47 Street
Genre: 
Farce
Author: 
David Mamet
Director: 
Joe Mantello
Review: 

That David Mamet wrote November is a surprise. That Nathan Lane is hilarious in it is not.

It's sitcom joke after joke after joke about a bad president ending his term, and it's great to have a master comedian with super timing in the role of the ridiculous ninny. Who would have thought Mamet could write like a team of network talk-show monologue creators? He does it very well.

Mixed in is a glimpse of some of the basic flaws of our country, a lot of it from the lesbian speechwriter (a marvelous Laurie Metcalf).

Scott Pask's Oval-Office set is perfect, and with Joe Mantello's sharp direction, it's laugh upon laugh for two acts. Lane does a great bit of comic movement, a mouse-like scamper in Act 2, that I will never forget.

Cast: 
Nathan Lane (Smith), Laurie Metcalf (Claire),
Technical: 
Set: Scott Pask; Lighting: Paul Gallo; Costumes: Laura Bauer
Other Critics: 
PAI David Lefkowitz +
Critic: 
Richmond Shepard
Date Reviewed: 
February 2008