(New York Times) The Off Broadway production of “The Pride,” about a fraught love triangle in 1958 and a stormy gay relationship in the present day, will extend for an additional week to March 28 because of audience demand, the producers announced on Wednesday.

Starring Hugh Dancy and Ben Whishaw and directed by Joe Mantello, “The Pride” opened on Tuesday to favorable-to-mixed reviews, and the producers said that the run is already 85 percent sold out. Box office business for “The Pride” on Wednesday broke the single-day ticket sale record for MCC Theater, the producer of the show.

NY1’s review (which is favorable, and contains clips from the play) and an old video from the rehearsal period:

MCC Theater’s “The Pride” featurette, which features a few more and the same clips from the play, as well as interviews.

Here is a small sampling of what the critics are saying about Hugh. Click the links for the full reviews.

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Village Voice – The acting, by all three principals as well as Adam James in a series of small roles, is first-class, with Dancy, subtly differentiating his two roles, casting the most intense magnetic field.

San Francisco Chronicle – Dancy is equally fine, particularly as the buttoned-up Philip of 1958, an anguished individual who even considers aversion therapy to “cure” himself from an attraction to men.

New Jersey Newsroom – Dancy naturally depicts a tightly-repressed gentleman of then and a well-adjusted fellow of today.

The Faster Times – Hugh Dancy has to my mind the more difficult role of the conflicted Philip, and if some may see the coldness that frames his intensity as the actor’s discomfort in such an explicit role, I see it as a choice to show the damage (self)inflicted on a man in denial.

Backstage – Dancy’s mightily repressed 1958 English alpha male, whose inherent masculinity is undermined by his desires, confidently embraces that same masculinity as part of his modern-day gay identity.

(more…)

It’s bad luck to say good luck on opening night, so to the cast of The Pride, break a leg! And to viewers of this site, enjoy the pictures that have come from the production. Be on the look-out over the next few days for pictures and media coming from the opening night party.

• 11 x The Pride: Stage Photos