Before anyone can criticize a production of Clifford Odetss’ 1935 Waiting for Lefty, it’s important to reflect on the specific time and place in which it was conceived. The country was reeling from the depths of an economic depression that caused untold suffering and despair. Jobs were scarce and many, like Odets, believed the Communist Party was the answer to solving the inequities that kept them hungry and out of work. Waiting for Lefty was groundbreaking, both in its messaging and ensemble performance. It was deemed an event of historical importance. And a critic of the original production proclaimed “A play like this does not die.” So very true because here we are, nearly a hundred years later, still finding relevance and still engaged in the work despite some missteps in a reconceived production directed by Steven Pasquale.
Odets was inspired by agitprop theater from Russia in which agitation and propaganda were used to influence public opinion. Waiting for Lefty is set in a union hall where taxi drivers are meeting to decide whether to go out on strike. Their corrupt union boss Harry Fatt (Greg Hildreth) is against strike plans but another member, Joe (Raffi Barsoumian) argues it’s the only option. Abruptly, the scene shifts to Joe’s home a week earlier when his wife, Edna (Tala Ashe) who’s just put the children to bed without any food, berates him for their impoverished state and convinces him to vote for the strike.
It’s one of several vignettes aimed at illustrating the many hardships working class Americans faced at the time. And while the nation is nowhere near that level of Depression era distress, there are plenty of present day parallels. One of the scenes depicts chemical lab technician, Miller (Austin Durant) who’s being promoted to work on poison gas production and is asked to spy on his supervisor. When he refuses the job on principle, his industrialist boss, Fayette (Henry Stram), tells him “if big business went sentimental over human life, there wouldn’t be big business of any sort.” In another vignette, a young Jewish hospital doctor (Adam Kantor) is told that the charity ward where he works is being closed down and he’s being replaced by the incompetent son of a US senator. His sympathetic supervisor says “The men who know their jobs don’t run anything here. The Constitution’s for rich men then and now.”
[Read Michael Sommers’ ★★☆☆☆ review here.]
Pasquale, best known for his stellar acting chops, is making his directorial debut and the results are mixed. On the plus side, he recruited songwriting duo Yeller Tooth (Sahar Milani and Cameron Scoggins) to compose original music and they deliver quite beautifully. Milani and Scoggins are equally gifted performers joining the 10 member ensemble. They’re all multi-talented singers and musicians performing numbers both original and familiar. Among the best of them: “If I Didn’t Care” and “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?”
Pasquale also felt the need to add interpretive movements courtesy choreographer Susan Misner. Throughout, we see the performers breaking the action, to contort their bodies in unified gestures that don’t seem to make much sense. The abstraction clashes with Odets’ literal depictions of the working poor. And it has a softening effect on the hard-core realities that give the play its unique pull.
When Waiting for Lefty premiered in 1935, it was a stirring call to action. As designed and directed, the audience was drawn into the performance and they were enthralled. The Group Theater director Harold Clurman declared “Audience and actors had become one.” The play doesn’t have that power anymore. Pasquale, to his credit, attempts to replicate the audience connection but the novelty is gone after so many years of more sophisticated work.
Still, the revival hits home with the disheartening realization that inequality has returned in record levels. Pasquale makes the point with handouts to the audience providing statistics illustrating the disparities between the haves and havenots in this country. My handout states the average American worker salary is $58,260 and we have now seen the planet’s first trillionaire. It asks how long would the average American worker need to work to approach trillionaire status. The shocking answer: 17,241,379 years. As Communism, Socialism and Fascism are back in the political debate, Odets’ Lefty doesn’t seem all that old after all.
Waiting for Lefty opened November 2, 2026, at the Classic Stage Company and runs through November 29. Tickets and information: classicstage.org
