The Ask. The Wild Project for tickets. By Matthew Freeman. Directed by Jessi D. Hill. With Betsy Aidem, Colleen Litchfield.
September 6th – 28th, 2024
Tickets $58.59 (including fees)
Runs 80 minutes with no intermission.
Review by Raven Snook for Time Out NY
“Director Jessi D. Hill keeps the staging simple and the pacing brisk, and elicits lovely performances from both actors. Aidem’s Greta may be funnier and more fleshed out, but Litchfield’s smart but circumspect Tanner is the one who pierces your heart as they calmly try to navigate an impossible conversation that echoes debates on social media and at dinner tables across the country. The Ask may be all talk, but it’s packed with intellectual action.”
Review by Niranjani Reddi for Theatre Beyond Broadway
“A wildly witty 80-minute play that knows its characters as well as it knows itself, ‘The Ask’ takes place entirely in liberal donor Greta’s Upper West Side apartment, where young fundraiser Tanner is trying to convince Greta to donate to the ACLU once again. It’s a feat in and of itself to have a full-length play with only two characters be thoroughly engaging, but every single person involved on this project achieved that and more. Not only did the writing tackle the division among the liberal voters in the United States, it did so with humor and love for both of its characters. The direction made the flow of the conversation seamless – and the actors were, for lack of a better term, fantastic.”
Review by Sara Holdren for Vulture (scroll to middle of page)
The Ask unfolds over 80 real-time minutes in the intimidatingly nice Upper West Side apartment of Greta (Betsy Aidem), a longtime donor to the ACLU who’s no longer certain that the organization — now represented by sincere, nonbinary, and Brooklyn-coded zillennial Tanner (Colleen Litchfield) — still upholds the values she’s supported with her checkbook. Although the pair manage to find some common ground in their mutual appreciation of Cindy Sherman and dinosaurs (“Well, we’re going to get along just fine,” says host to guest overhastily), the tension ratchets up from there.
Under Jessi D. Hill’s meticulous direction, Aidem and Litchfield play off each other like expert musicians, both wielding finely tuned instruments but each insisting—at first politely, then with increasing fervor and dissonance — on playing in different keys.
Review by Loren Noveck for exeuntNYC
Playwright Matthew Freeman and director Jessi D. Hill bring suspense, nuance, and deep philosophical questions to a two-hander about charitable giving. You’ll never look at a nonprofit solicitation the same way again. Loren Noveck reviews.
