The Sound Inside Tickets

By: Adam Rapp
Director: David Cromer
Producer: Jeffrey Richards, Lincoln Center Theater and Rebecca Gold
Cast list: Mary-Louise Parker (as Bella) and Will Hochman (as Christopher)
Design: Alexander Woodward
Lighting: Heather Gilbert
Costume: David Hyman
Sound: Daniel Kluger
Other info: Original Music by Daniel Kluger and Projection
Design: by Aaron Rhyne

Pulitzer Prize finalist Adam Rapp makes his Broadway debut with this devastating two-hander in which a terminally ill professor, played by Tony winner Mary-Louise Parker, finds kinship with one of her young male writing students played by Broadway newcomer Will Hochman. Though the duo doesn’t immediately see eye to eye, both have something the other, perhaps reluctantly, needs.

The play premiered last summer at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, and the drama finds much of its most dramatic moments in those that are the most silent. That the show mines its catharsis from quiet is no surprise given its director is David Cromer, who won a Tony Award for doing exactly that with the musical “The Band’s Visit.” The play runs at Studio 54 and promises to wrench — and ultimately restore — for every last one of its 90 minutes.

Children under the age of 4 are not permitted in theatre.

What to watch for

“The Sound Inside” brings Mary-Louise Parker back to Broadway for the first time since 2016; however when the limited run concludes, she won’t stay away for long. “The Sound Inside” is one of two Broadway shows Parker will lead this season. Come spring, the Tony and Emmy Award winner will star in a production of Paula Vogel’s “How I Learned to Drive,” reprising her role from the original 1997 Off-Broadway production.

In a play about writing, it’s only natural that several writers and their work will be name-dropped. Be on the lookout for a number of both literary and dramatic allusions throughout “The Sound Inside,” among them Virginia Woolf, Samuel Beckett, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, “Crime and Punishment,” and “Old Yeller” — all purveyors of deep tragedy, of course.

Audiences of both theater and television are well-aware of the genius of Mary-Louise Parker (in addition to her Tony, she has a shiny Emmy Award), so what will surprise them about “The Sound Inside” is her costar, Will Hochman. This will be the young performer’s Broadway debut, however he’s been a working actor for years, having appeared in the television film “Paterno” as well as an episode of “The Code.”