Broadway’s Marquis Theatre is the latest to be turned upside down by Stranger Things: The First Shadow.
Following its’ successful ongoing run in London’s West End, where it recently won two Olivier Awards for Best Entertainment and Best Set Design, the production, based on an original story by brothers Matt and Ross Duffer, Jack Thorne, and Kate Trefry, officially opened on April 22 on Broadway.
Produced by Netflix and Sonia Friedman Productions, Stranger Things: The First Shadow features an ensemble of 34 actors in a stand-alone story from Trefry, rooted in the world of the hit Netflix series.
The play takes place in the fictional Indiana town of Hawkins in 1959, where the Creel family seeks a fresh start for their teenage son, Henry, who longs to escape his troubled past. “But when a wave of shocking crimes strikes the town, Henry is forced to confront a terrifying truth: is something inside him that connects him to the horrors unfolding around him?” An official logline reads.
Directed by three-time Tony winner Stephen Daldry and co-directed by Justin Martin, Stranger Things: The First Shadow does not currently have an end date. And in a competitive Broadway season filled with major movie stars headlining Shakespeare revivals and bringing fresh film adaptations to the Main Stem, critics were honest with what Stranger Things: The First Shadow brings to the table.
Multiple reviewers drew a comparison between Stranger Things: The First Shadow and Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, both of which are produced by Friedman and had illusions designed by Jamie Harrison.
In a three-star review for Time Out New York, Adam Feldman wrote: “Harry Potter playwright Jack Thorne is even co-credited with shaping this play’s story alongside its overall author, Kate Trefry, and the Duffer Brothers, who created the TV series. Unlike Cursed Child, however—the pre-Ozempic version, at least—The First Shadow doesn’t offer much by way of characters or plot beyond adding meager flesh to already familiar bones. And padding a skeleton doesn’t make it scarier, just bulkier.”
Charles Isherwood of The Wall Street Journal argued Harry Potter and the Cursed Child “did a vastly better job of humanizing its characters.”
“All these characters do not have the time to become fully developed individuals (some are stereotypes that could be pulled from “Grease), as similar ones did in the series,” Isherwood noted. “Although the actors give polished performances, it’s hard to become deeply involved in what happens to anyone onstage—including Henry, who, despite [Louis] McCartney’s valiant turn, is thoroughly charmless and lacking in the quiet pathos of his primary counterpart in the TV show, the also-superpowered girl called Eleven.”
Meanwhile, The Washington Post’s Naveen Kumar, called the show a “terrifying cash grab.”
“But the extravagantly staged brand extension is a Broadway play only in the technical sense — in address, price point and duration,” Kumar wrote. “To draw audiences through its nearly three hours, the show lurches forward like an episodic binge-watch, banking on and rewarding extensive familiarity with the sci-fi hit.”
However, The New York Times’ Elisabeth Vincentelli said audience members need not have seen the TV series to follow the stage adaptation, even if it might be beneficial. “If Vecna doesn’t ring a bell, or if you don’t know that Eleven is better than One, don’t fret: It’s possible to follow the show anyway, and to enjoy it,” Vincentelli wrote.
“The production is at its technical best when seamlessly combining Miriam Buether’s set, which includes a diner where the kids hang out, with mechanical and digital wizardry, while the theater occasionally rattles with infra-bass for extra mood,” Vincentelli continued. “Except for the cheesy rendering of an animatronic-like Mind Flayer, it’s all rather impressive. But it also feels a little hollow.”
Deadline’s Greg Evans echoed Vincentelli’s sentiment on the depth of the play, writing: “Sure, it’s more surface than substance, and its depictions of how we humans long for connection of any sort is sincere if not particularly original. But just try not to be tickled by even the simplest of the show’s trickery, like when a book fallen from a school locker flies right back in.”
