Broadway Reviews Theatre Review by Howard Miller - April 16, 2026 Proof by David Auburn. Directed by Thomas Kail. Scenic design by Teresa L. Williams. Costume design by Dede Ayite. Lighting design by Amanda Zieve. Sound design by Justin Ellington and Connor Wang. Wig and hair design by Mia Neal. Music by Kris Bowers. Associate director Tiffany Nichole Greene.
The production, splendidly directed by Thomas Kail, is anchored by an extraordinary performance by Ayo Edebiri, making one of the more auspicious Broadway debuts to come along in a very long time. Edebiri, an Emmy winner for her role in FX's "The Bear," is giving a mesmerizing performance as Catherine. She is the play's central character, a young woman who dropped out of college at the age of 20 in order to care for her father, a renowned math superstar whose mental collapse stopped a brilliant career in its tracks. The play opens on Catherine's twenty-fifth birthday and takes place largely on the back porch of an older home near the University of Chicago where Catherine's father, Robert (Don Cheadle, no slouch as a highly respected actor in his own right), had been a leading scholar. The two of them, father and daughter, are having a late-night conversation. It is only later revealed that Robert recently passed away, and that this "conversation" is a product of Catherine's own exhausted and troubled mind. The overriding mystery on which the play hinges is whether Catherine, who has carried the burden of being her father's caregiver since she was barely out of her teens, has inherited his mathematics bent and possibly his mental deterioration (he first "went bughouse," as he puts it, in his early twenties). These questions circle Catherine and the play's two additional characters for the rest of the evening. One way or the other, everyone is seeking "proof," sifting through tantalizing clues that fail to provide definitive answers. (The other meaning of the play's title is a mathematical concept that also becomes quite relevant.) The wonder of Proof as a dramatic work lies in the ways in which David Auburn has created a quartet of characters who are so multi-dimensional as to hand the director and performers the opportunity to highlight any aspect of their personalities and still ring true. In this production, the characters of Catherine's older sister Claire and of Robert's math protégé, Hal, are both complexly drawn and considerably bolstered by actors for whom the term "supportive roles" becomes irrelevant.
Jin Ha (Hamilton, Here We Are) is terrific as well in the role of Hal, an endearing nerd and a budding romantic partner for Catherine. But Hal is also complicated, an ambitious mathematician who is equally attracted to Robert's unexamined notebooks, a potential career-boosting treasure trove that he very much wants to get his hands on. Proof is showing a remarkable propensity for withstanding the test of time, as fresh as when it made its first New York appearance a quarter century ago. The cast is ideal, the direction keen, and the design elements are perfectly in tune with the actions onstage. This is an altogether first-class production that speaks to the brain and the heart in equal measure, a winner in every way.
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