Rating: 
Summary: Deathly pretentious and preachy
Review: After reading, watching and enjoying such plays such as Angels parts 1 and 2 I was excited to learn that Kushner had a new play on the stage, Homebody/Kabul. However after reading and painfully forcing myself to watch this beast of a play I wish that I had never heard of it. Homebody starts off with a 30+ min monolouge that is essentially a history lesson of how the world esp. the West has raped and denuded the peoples of Afghanistan. Clerly this monolouge is meant to grab the attention of the audience via Fox/CNN news sensationalistic yellow journalism tactics and evoke some sense of disgust or rage. I personally simply felt insulted that I was subjected to such a snorefest of a history lesson whose dumbed down antics were supposed to make me "think" yet only made me wish that I had stayed home and watched the history channel instead. Next we have Kushner's patented rant/rave morality lessons that are delivered with the obtuse handling of an embittered child. The character motivations were sparatic and inconsistant. Each action to reaction seemed more implausable than the next not to mention improbable within the world that was created for us. Another huge fault of this play is Kushner's cliche facination with the obnoxious Western tourist character. His play tries to evoke shame and self disgust with our western society however it comes across once again as a them good, we bad type of situation. As has been said before a great or even good piece of art is not moral it simply explores what is moral. I must say however that Kushner does have a wonderful turn of phrase in this play as well as a poetic spirit that can at it's best keep us guessing as to whether or not the play might have some redeeming quality. But quite frankly I have to say that if you read the afterward in the TCG printing of the script you can get all of the same information and tone as you would in the 4 hour read or dramatic version. To put it simply when Kushner is at his best, no one is better. when Kushner is at his worst, there is no one worse. And this is by far his worst.
Rating: 
Summary: Kushner's Prescient Drama
Review: Although some readers may be disappointed the Tony Kushner's latest play is not at all similar to his first great play, ANGELS IN AMERICA, it is one of the best plays of the decade. Kushner begins with a character who is drawn to travel to Afghanistan where she disappears. Her husband and grown daughter arrive in Kabul under the Taliban to find their wife/mother. They never do find her, but instead are exposed to life in Afghanistan under the Taliban -- a country retaining aspects of its great history, but living in a present of oppression and fear. Through this, Kushner explores the West's culpability in the tragedy of Afghanistan, the ability of the human spirit to survive under the worst possible circumstances, and the need on both sides to truly experience and understand the other. The play is filled with Kushner's trademark style -- a Brechtian, cinematic structure -- and lyrical flights of language, rich characterizations, and fascinating, disturbing ideas about a part of the world few Americans understood or knew much about prior to the tragedies of September 11. Now, more than ever, this play raises some of the most important questions of our time.
Rating:
Summary: HOMEBODY KABUL IS THE THING THAT RULE
Review: Can you imagine a play that is awesome? I can, because I saw it last month at the Hillsboro community center for Arts Performance. It was Tony Kushners (no relation to Ashton : )) play called Homebody Kabul. What is good about it? The timeliness, and also how it relates to our situation in the Middle East and in Afghanistan and in Pakistan also right now. Of course, after I saw the play I immediately bought the book and then read the play in the book, and I was not disappointed--its Kushner's dramatic explication of important ideas that really made the characters "leap" off the page and into my imagination, not to mention how it made me think. I recommend this book to the socially-minded literati of today's generation X youth. Good? Yes it is. Also check out his other play, Angles in America.
Rating:
Summary: HOMEBODY KABUL IS THE THING THAT RULE
Review: Can you imagine a play that is awesome? I can, because I saw it last month at the Hillsboro community center for Arts Performance. It was Tony Kushners (no relation to Ashton : )) play called Homebody Kabul. What is good about it? The timeliness, and also how it relates to our situation in the Middle East and in Afghanistan and in Pakistan also right now. Of course, after I saw the play I immediately bought the book and then read the play in the book, and I was not disappointed--its Kushner's dramatic explication of important ideas that really made the characters "leap" off the page and into my imagination, not to mention how it made me think. I recommend this book to the socially-minded literati of today's generation X youth. Good? Yes it is. Also check out his other play, Angles in America.
Rating: 
Summary: Good ideas, sloppy execution
Review: Having written one of the great plays of contemporary American theatre, surely Kushner feels that his last piece was a tough act to follow. So what does he do? He tries to write something that will have a quieter opening than the last one. But, suddenly with the events of september 11 one of the most talented playwrights in the country is opening a play set largely in Afghanistan and discussing the troubles between the west (particularly America and England) and its conflicts with Aghanistan and Islam. The play contains some brilliant poetic images and chilling moments, but the trouble is a play that runs nearly four hours when performed, these moments do not stretch out the entire piece. A British woman seeks the grave of Cain only to disappear completely, an Muslim woman goes mad in passion for her country and makes a eery prophetic statement that the Taliban is coming to New York, and another man tries to persuade a western girl the beauties of an invented language with no history of oppression. There is a goldmine of valuable ideas in this work and it would be foolish to pass it by. The difficulty is that the play largely limps to a start with a very long rambling monologue with interesting ideas about a homebody desiring escape in her vision of Afghanistan a nearly orientalist construct. With four hours of material here, while the afghanistan scenes clip along at a steady and intense pace one has to wonder why the play wasn't cut down. Certainly a few edits here and there wouldn't have hurt. While this is not perfection nor genius, there is some good material here and Kushner's work deserves the readers it gets.
Rating:
Summary: I would like to meet Homebody
Review: Homebody's extended thought streams and speeches were wonderful. I would like to meet her, assuming she is not dead of course. This is the first play I have read by Tony Kushner and I have never been lucky enough to see any of his plays performed. I think he is a fascinating writer. I laughed, I learned, I was outraged, I nodded my head in agreement. Tony Kushner was quoted and an excerpt was read from "Homebody/Kabul" at a local Not in Our Name event. His words and work resonate with the time. Since I wrote the above review, I saw the play last night. It is even more powerful on stage. In the long Homebody monologue, it felt like the audience wanted to support Homebody, she seemed vulnerable alone on the stage for so long. Her comments made the audience laugh, nod in agreement, and feel her sadness. The tone changed in the second half of the play and the audience seemed wrung out at the end with all the emotions and ideas to ponder. Whether read or watched, this play is exceedingly powerful. I highly recommend both.
Rating:
Summary: The great dramatist of our time takes on Afghanistan
Review: I have been a huge Tony Kushner fan ever since i read and subsequently performed in Angels in America my first and second years of college. I bought Homebody/Kabul as soon as it came out in paperback, and was fortunate enough to see it performed at the Intiman Theater in Seattle recently. After reading and seeing this play, my love for Kushner and his work has only deepened.
At this point, to call Kushner a master of language is to belabor the point. He capable of provoking any reaction under the sun, from hilarity to pathos to utter despair, with a simple, poetic phrase one moment, then a completely different reaction the next. I also won't waste time your time with my interpretation of the "message" of the play, though it certainly has many messages. The first act of Homebody/Kabul consist of one character (the Homebody) sitting in a chair recounting a selective history of Afghanistan mixed in with stories from her life, for an entire hour! Now, read on the page this can get tedious at times, though the stories are interesting. But Ellen McLaughlin, the masterful actor who performed the role in Seattle, sat on stage in one place for that whole hour and commanded the entire attention of the audience. It was mind-boggling, awe-inspiring, transporting, and reminded me forcibly of the difference between reading and performance. McLaughlin took the, admittedly brilliantly constructed, words on the page and turned them into something vital, poetic, and magical.
The rest of the play deals with the aftermath of the Homebody's decision to go to Kabul and disappear. Her husband Milton and her daughter Priscilla, hearing she has been killed, go to Kabul to recover her body. Soon evidence turns up that she may have taken the veil and married a Muslim man. But she is never actually seen again, leaving the other characters to come to their own conclusions and deal with her disappearance as best they can. Along the way we are treated to hilariously funny moments, such as Priscilla almost setting her burqua on fire with a cigarrette and Milton trying opium and heroin with junkie NGO employee Quango Twistleton, and heartbreaking ones such as an Afghan woman's multilingual rant about the state of her country and a man moved to tears by a Frank Sinatra song.
As a whole the play is certainly not perfect, it is sometimes unwieldy and some scenes seem under developed. But for me this is more than made up for by its scope, ambition, and searching intelligence. This is not Tony Kushner telling us what to think, he is presenting us with historical information filtered through the eyes of some deeply flawed but fascinating and ultimately human characters. In the end, he does not lay blame for the miserable state of Afghanistan on this or that country or faction, but shows how eveyone is responsible and no one wants to take the responsibility of really making it right. See it performed if you can, but if you can't, read the script, mull it over, and come to your own conclusions.
Rating:
Summary: The great dramatist of our time takes on Afghanistan
Review: I have been a huge Tony Kushner fan ever since i read and subsequently performed in Angels in America my first and second years of college. I bought Homebody/Kabul as soon as it came out in paperback, and was fortunate enough to see it performed at the Intiman Theater in Seattle recently. After reading and seeing this play, my love for Kushner and his work has only deepened.
At this point, to call Kushner a master of language is to belabor the point. He capable of provoking any reaction under the sun, from hilarity to pathos to utter despair, with a simple, poetic phrase one moment, then a completely different reaction the next. I also won't waste time your time with my interpretation of the "message" of the play, though it certainly has many messages. The first act of Homebody/Kabul consist of one character (the Homebody) sitting in a chair recounting a selective history of Afghanistan mixed in with stories from her life, for an entire hour! Now, read on the page this can get tedious at times, though the stories are interesting. But Ellen McLaughlin, the masterful actor who performed the role in Seattle, sat on stage in one place for that whole hour and commanded the entire attention of the audience. It was mind-boggling, awe-inspiring, transporting, and reminded me forcibly of the difference between reading and performance. McLaughlin took the, admittedly brilliantly constructed, words on the page and turned them into something vital, poetic, and magical.
The rest of the play deals with the aftermath of the Homebody's decision to go to Kabul and disappear. Her husband Milton and her daughter Priscilla, hearing she has been killed, go to Kabul to recover her body. Soon evidence turns up that she may have taken the veil and married a Muslim man. But she is never actually seen again, leaving the other characters to come to their own conclusions and deal with her disappearance as best they can. Along the way we are treated to hilariously funny moments, such as Priscilla almost setting her burqua on fire with a cigarrette and Milton trying opium and heroin with junkie NGO employee Quango Twistleton, and heartbreaking ones such as an Afghan woman's multilingual rant about the state of her country and a man moved to tears by a Frank Sinatra song.
As a whole the play is certainly not perfect, it is sometimes unwieldy and some scenes seem under developed. But for me this is more than made up for by its scope, ambition, and searching intelligence. This is not Tony Kushner telling us what to think, he is presenting us with historical information filtered through the eyes of some deeply flawed but fascinating and ultimately human characters. In the end, he does not lay blame for the miserable state of Afghanistan on this or that country or faction, but shows how eveyone is responsible and no one wants to take the responsibility of really making it right. See it performed if you can, but if you can't, read the script, mull it over, and come to your own conclusions.
Rating:
Summary: A feast of language
Review: I was fortunate enough to see this performed in New York last year. This play unleashes great torrents of language and ideas at every turn and is the theatrical equivalent of a clusterbomb. Yet, with time to read and mull, it becomes something quite different. Years of work and research are hung on the frame of a simple melodrama about a father and daughter searching in a strange country for a wife and mother. Kushner's mythical Afghanistan is a place where the tower of Babel toppled and people speak everything from Russian to Esperanto. The hapless British thrust into this burka'd world will never grasp that we in the west have "succumbed to luxury" -- though perhaps the audience will. Some other reviewers found the Homebody's monologue dull on the page. I assure you it is quite stirring in performance. The same may be said of much of the play which, like Angels in America, is unwieldy but brilliant. Kushner has admitted in interviews that the play should be trimmed but I think, when reading the play, the overambitiousness is a plus. Kushner is a playwright with a social consciousness, but also a literary and poetic conscientiousness. The use of 'sunny' as an adjective recalls Sunni and the etymology of Quango's name is a play unto itself. This play is 'about' too many things to effectively say what it is about. I appreciate it as a feast of language and a virtuoso display of Kushner's talent. While it may run long and fail to cohere thematically, it is shorter and more thematically coherent than Angels. What is a clusterbomb in the theater is chocolate cake when iced with covers.
Rating:
Summary: Pick your poison
Review: Like Angels in America, Kushner juxtaposes two seemingly different people and their respective societies, only to show how similar they really are. What are more absurd, Kushner seems to ask, some of the obvious horrors of life in Afghanistan, or some of the subtle opiates that constitute life in the Western world? Neither society appears to be fulfilling in the long run, though a change of scenery seems to be the tonic. Kushner describes a world in which the insanity of one world appears to be the cure for the insanity caused by the other. This play is certainl though-provoking, and not easily forgotten. I'd love to see it in the theater.
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