N's Reviews > Angels in America

Reading these two plays totally blew my mind- both in positive and mindbending ways. First at the heart of "Angels" are characters left behind, characters suffering a broken heart, and wondering how love went wrong for them- especially for Prior and Harper; and the complexities of ambivalent feelings that Joe and Louis wind up having for each other against the backdrop of the dying Roy Cohn and the fear and specter of AIDS.

The ideas of love, metaphysics, sexuality, fluidity have always been the crux of Kushner's opus, but sometimes his dialogue gets a little heavy-handed with too much sentimentality or preachiness.

However, I have just seen the latest Broadway revival (2018) starring Nathan Lane as Cohn, and Andrew Garfield as Prior; and both left indelible impressions on me as Al Pacino, Meryl Streep and Justin Kirk did in the miniseries directed by Mike Nichols. Throw in a little Ethel Rosenberg, an awakened Hannah Pitt, and a very, very strange angel- you are in for a theatrical reading treat.