Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – Steven Pasquale directs Clifford Odets’ WAITING FOR LEFTY, infusing music and movement to bring soul to the play’s blunt didacticism

• By drediman
• November 3, 2026
• No Comments

With all the agitation in the air these days, it’s no surprise that theater-makers are turning to Clifford Odets to channel their frustrations and take a political stance. In the next month or two alone, two major New York theater companies are set to present a pair of his most notable works. First up is Classic Stage Company’s timely revival of the playwright’s 1935 play Waiting For Lefty, which opened last night in an anticipated Off-Broadway revival, marking the directorial debut of actor Stephen Pasquale (his Lefty will be quickly followed by Manhattan Theatre Club’s upcoming Broadway revival of Awake and Sing!). For those of you unfamiliar with play, it opens with a New York City taxi driver union meeting, during which the drivers heatedly debate amongst themselves whether to go on strike as they wait for the arrival of their union president Lefty Costello. The play then transitions into a series of individual vignettes depicting the dire situations that drove a select seven of these drivers to the attend the meeting in the first place.

I had only seen one production of the work before. That would be about twenty years at a storefront theater in Chicago, where I was living at the time. As such, I was eager to re-familiarize myself with this much discussed yet rarely-produced play. There’s no doubt that Waiting for Lefty, with its tough talking, truth saying pro-labor scenes, is black-and-white political theater with a capital “P”. Thankfully, Pasquale has infused elements of music (courtesy of Yeller Tooth, whose sensitive music and arrangements are the heart of the production) and movement (the evocative yet grounded choreography is by Susan Misner). These additional contributions soften the work’s blunt didacticism and conjure poetic inner lives, bringing much needed emotional depth and texture to a play that, despite its passionate outcry, otherwise lacks nuance and subtlety. Additionally, these musical and choreographic sequences do well to allow the dramatic scenes to breathe, thereby giving audiences room to process and reflect upon them more meaningfully. Thankfully, the transitions into and out of them are handled artfully, giving the staging a soulful quality that nicely counterbalances the punchiness and sense of urgency of Odets’ dialogue. In a potentially controversial decision, Pasquale has also chosen to physically manifest Lefty, portraying — strictly through mime and movement — his journey to the union meeting and the tragic end that befalls him before he gets to his destination.

Only two blocks from Union Square, Classic Stage Company’s intimate Off-Broadway home on 13th Street, the Lynn F. Angelson Theater, is an ideal venue for the play. Indeed, in a lot of ways, the theater already looks like the kind of unadorned hall that would host such a meeting. Production-wise, kudos must also go to the atmospheric lighting design and enhancing sound design by Mextly Couzin and Palmer Hefferan, respectively, whose work imbues the staging with just the right amount of immersion. The ensemble cast of ten — including such reliable performers as Austin Durant, Greg Hildreth, Adam Kantor, and Henry Stram — is in wonderful synchronicity and invariably on the same wavelength throughout, whether in their scene work, communal song (“Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” hit hard), or interweaving physicality. Collectively, they give the production an organic and seamless feel that mirrors what makes labor unions so impactful in the first place — the ability to work together on a united font for the greater good.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

WAITING FOR LEFTY
Off-Broadway, Play
Classic Stage Company
1 hours, 20 minutes (without an intermission)
Through November 29