Do You Feel Anger? by Mara Nelson-Greenberg

Starring Tom Aulino, Ugo Chukwu, Megan Hill, Greg Keller, Justin Long, Jeanne Sakata, and Tiffany Villarin

Scenic Design by Laura Jellinek

Costume Design by Emilio Sosa

Lighting Design by Marie Yokoyama

Sound Design and Composition by Palmer Hefferan

Production Stage Manager: Megan Dickert

All photos taken by Carol Rosegg for the Vineyard 2019 production.

P R E S S:

“FLAT-OUT HILARIOUS!  INGENIOUS AND INSPIRED. Ms. Nelson-Greenberg has had the inspired notion of translating everyday sexism into the ostensibly nonsensical language of absurdism, as it was practiced by the likes of Eugene Ionesco, the young Edward Albee and, more recently, Christopher Durang.”

-       Ben Brantley, The New York Times

“If Mara Nelson-Greenberg’s Do You Feel Anger? were a person, it might be some wild-eyed combination of Kate McKinnon on Saturday Night Live and Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight. IT’S FUNNY, IT’S MORDANT, AND IT KEEPS YOU ON EDGE WITH A LOOPINESS THAT MASKS SOMETHING SOMBER AND TRULY FRIGHTENING.

Director Margot Bordelon smartly keeps the play zinging along at a breathless pace. There’s a vertiginous feeling to the whole thing — we laugh, we feel ill, we’re rushed forward before our gorges can finish rising. It’s semi-feral and mischievous, a little warped and yet smart as hell.”

-       Sara Holdren, New York Magazine

“A PROVOCATIVE, WILD COMEDY. IT’S INFECTIOUS. Mara Nelson-Greenberg is an offbeat, novel, wonderful voice making her New York debut.

And it’s this mercurial subversion of our expectations that lies at the core of Nelson-Greenberg’s anarchic humor, as well as Margot Bordelon’s loopy direction of her talented cast. Everybody’s playing on the same very wrinkled page. Even Laura Jellinek’s set, Emilio Sosa’s costumes and Marie Yokoyama’s lighting deliver their own surprises.”

-       Robert Hofler, The Wrap

"DO YOU FEEL ANGER? IS AS DISQUIETING AS IT IS FUNNY!  A RARE THROWBACK TO CLASSIC ABSURDISM.”

-       Elisabeth Vincentelli, The New Yorker

“HILARIOUS! BOLD AND TRENCHANT. Through bold performances and specific design, director Margot Bordelon maintains the comical tone of Nelson-Greenberg's script without sacrificing any of its seriousness. We immediately recognize the location from Laura Jellinek's joyless conference room set. Audience members are likely to spot items from their own office wardrobe in Emilio Sosa's costumes. But from this realistic design springs a fantastic, terrifying world.”

-       Zachary Stewart, TheaterMania

“AN APT, TIMELY PRODUCTION STRONGLY DIRECTED BY MARGOT BORDELON. Bordelon keeps the pace lively and her adept cast, gamely inhabits characters deeply flawed people. Long, Chukwu, and Keller are hilarious in their inhumane approach to life.  They offer deft, honestly clueless performances. Hill is brilliant – gently crafting a strong survivor. Nelson-Greenberg has a flair for uninhibited one-liners which brusquely challenge misogyny, communication and deception.  The play is richly absurdist and a successfully astringent, stinging fun-house mirror.”

-       Adam Cohen, TheaterPizzazz

“DO YOU FEEL ANGER? DELIVERS THE LAUGHS, THEN PACKS A PUNCH!  It’s as meaningful as it is outrageous.  A biting send up of work place dynamics… Bordelon’s pacing is fast and furious and the decibel level high, as the men, fueled by coffee and testosterone, empowerment and rage, question why they should be expected to change their whole worldview and “why someone else’s feelings should outweigh mine?,” leaving the women to deal with the male-dominated status quo in their own unsupported and ineffectual ways.”

-       Deb Miller, DC Metro Arts

“If you've enjoyed seeing life refracted on the stage through the cleverly skewed absurdist lens of EUGENE IONESCO, CHRISTOPHER DURANG or DAVID IVES, you can now enthusiastically welcome MARA NELSON-GREENBERG to this wacky inner circle. Terrific and purposefully scary. A fresh new voice in the theater.”

-       Simon Saltzman, Curtain Up

“A razor-sharp, whip-smart satire of contemporary workplace culture, “Do You Feel Anger?” is the blissful antithesis of complacent theatre-making in which you never quite know what is going to happen next.  Equal parts hilarious and horrifying, Ms. Nelson-Greenberg, director Margot Bordelon, and their cast serve up a highly digestible, surrealist critique of mores around empathy consciousness, sexual harassment, hyper-masculinity, and female agency.” 

-       Robert Russo, Stage Left

“A BRILLIANT PLAY! PROFOUND AND VALIDATING. The hilarity from the over-the-top staging by Margot Bordelon offers a reprieve while still critiquing the men’s blatantly inappropriate behavior. The ridiculously exaggerated stubbornness and backwards thinking exhibited by the male debt collectors is designed to keep the play light, but as the play went on, I found it increasingly difficult to laugh along with the rest of the audience. The longer I watched, the more their behavior reminded me of far too many men I know. Men I’ve worked with. Men close to me who can’t handle the “personal affront” of an opinion that contradicts their own. Men who’ve asked me politely for directions at a subway station only to turn their encounter into an unwelcome sexual advance. Men who only leave women alone when we lie and say we belong to another man. Men on the internet wielding anonymity to spew vitriol and even death threats towards women. Men like Brett Kavanaugh who lash out and turn illogical blame on everyone around them the instant they are suddenly held accountable for hurting others. And men like Donald Trump, who are rewarded for mediocrity, and who suffer no consequences despite blatant evidence of their toxic behavior against women, people of color, and other marginalized communities. And there are scores of other unnamed men whispered about amongst us girls, whose crimes and blatant inadequacies as leaders won’t be brought to light, because who really wants to put themselves up against a man with that much power? (And who would believe us anyway? And even if they do, would they care?)

In answer to your question, Ms. Nelson-Greenberg: Yes, I do feel anger. I feel anger because I know how easily situations like these become dangerous for women. I feel anger because empathy for a stubborn opposing side that doesn’t see your own humanity does not translate to empathy towards you, no matter how much you want to “be the better person.” And I feel anger (and heartbreak, and shame) because it’s all too easy to become complicit in a power structure that undermines one’s humanity, even if for the sake of “passing” as “non-threatening” in such an environment. 

But, I also feel grateful because you’ve made your New York debut with a brilliant play that expertly wrestles with that complexity, with the daily battles women are fighting to be heard and respected, and with how women can help hold each other up in a world that keeps trying to tear us down.”

-       Rachel Abrams, Theater is Easy; BEST BET