An excellent ensemble piece, Seminar, a new play by Theresa Rebeck, explores the lives of four aspiring young writers and their influential and often abusive professor.  As the writers explore the intricacies of making meaningful art and being financially successful in this endeavor, they face the challenge of surviving the obstructive criticism of their cynical though lauded instructor.

Having paid a substantial sum to be taught by the praised writer, each student is expecting a valuable experience.  When some realize this expense may have been poorly invested, a struggle amongst the group ensues to either rectify or justify their participation. An affair between the professor and a student under his tutelage serves to exasperate this battle as each pupil strives to find their voice and place in the group.

The humor in this play is often derived from the uncomfortable nature of watching a young person’s dreams eviscerated by a leader in the art community.  Unfortunately, this is often the cornerstone for education in the highly critical and subjective medium of creation.  Comedy is also invoked by the willingness of the students to turn a critical eye on each other in the wake of the demoralizing experience of the destruction of their work.  

An unapologetic explanation from the professor as to his highly disparaging nature serves to unlock the mystery of his actions but does not attempt to excuse his behavior.  With this, Rebeck artfully explores the motivations of disapproving leaders in the art community without justifying their ineffectual attempts to share their hard-earned wisdom.

Seminar has excellent roles for women and men, evenly distributed humor and every character making a journey for their art.  This play is great choice for a company with a talented young cast.

Seminar is  a play about the creative writing business of the late-20th / early-21st century. Two male leads and two female leads come together to hire a lauded editor as their private writing tutor, and through these 5 characters' interactions the audience is privy to debates on the essence and ethics of writing in the modern western world. Some of the characters are willing to sleep their way to the top of the writing world, some value truth and expression more than anything in the world, and some just want to have their names in the press.

Seminar has many strong points. It has moments of comedy, of drama, of romance. It has five generally equal roles, which make it a good piece for a college or community theater, or any place in which ensemble work thrives. It has much room for interpretation– settings such as 'Upper West Side loft' give enough information to inspire a sophisticated set without demanded a particular staging.

Setting these positive aspects aside, the play does have it's faults. There are some major bumps in character development, and as a company putting this on you may find that the text requires smoothing out. At times, Seminar asks the audience to make jumps that are just a little too big, accepting dissonant character decisions– such as the manipulative seductress character also being the ditzy and talentless member of the writing group.

Overall, this is a strong piece to produce; it has something to say, and it doesn't fail to entertain.

Theresa Rebeck’s Seminar, set in New York City, details a writing class for emerging writers, taught by an acerbic and bitter professor.   The dialogue is fast and furiously funny.  The voice of the playwright overwhelms the characters; there are no idiosyncrasies in the characters’ speech, their voices only the writer’s.  This is unproblematic;  Rebeck's voice is witty, sharp, and vastly amusing. The plot consists of various intellectual squabbles and sordid, amoral love affairs indicative of the disillusioned New York hipster culture and self-indulgently hedonistic, wealthy trust fund artists.  Beneath the fast-paced flurry of witticisms and sure to land jokes, the themes and content of the work are largely unclear and post modern.  The work explores no clear themes or asks no clear questions.  The piece is merely a portrayal of these characters and a harsh satire of the creative writing world in New York City.  The action is often presented from the lens of the leading male protagonists, Martin, with whom Rebeck most emphatically depicts, and the charmingly caustic Leonard.  Even intelligent, feisty Kate becomes more a romantic plot device for the stories of the two leading male characters.  Her romance with Leonard at the end, feels more a desperate ploy to create some kind of action in a piece with relatively little real plot, besides meaningless, unrewarding romances, and narcissistic discussions of writing, and resonates as being untrue to the character.  Still, this piece is humorous, engaging, and vastly entertaining.