Sahar Bibiyan as Roya in the Guthrie Theater’s production of English, now playing through August 18. Photo by Liz Lauren.

There are few theatrical shows for which sound design and dialect coaching are more essential than the Guthrie Theater/Goodman Theatre production of English. This humorous, moving, and always engaging play perfectly captures the experience of struggling to learn another language, with all of its ups, downs, and reversals.

A plot summary of the play would be spoiling and also unnecessary. San Toossi’s 2023 Pulitzer Prize-winning script is smart, the characters highly relatable, and some of the poignant philosophical questions raised are likely to show up in your post-show conversation. What does it mean to present yourself in a different language? What happens to your self-image when you feel that your native tongue is not valued? What is it like to be caught in-between?

As directed by Hamid Dehghani, English flows smoothly from vignette to vignette, following an ensemble cast of characters as their inner layers are slowly unwrapped. The reveals are highly rewarding, with the audience raptly waiting as secrets slip and new revelations emerge. It’s an intense and energizing 90 or so minutes of theatre, with no intermission.

The ensemble cast features Sahar Bibiyan as Roya, Nikki Massoud as Elham, Roxanna Hope Radja as Marjan, Pej Vahdat as Omid, and Shadee Vossoughi as Goli. The performances are uniformly excellent, with audiences bound to split about their own favorite characters and performances.

What is it like to watch English? The immersive sound design by Mikaal Sulaiman sweeps audiences into the inner sonic worlds of the different characters as they move from the soundscapes of podcasts, movies, and radio into and out of the classroom. Lighting designer Jason Lynch paints the stage with mornings, late afternoons, and evenings, dabbing Courtney O’Neill’s unit set with color. It is clear from the first scene that vocal and dialect coaches Keely Wolter and Vaneh Assadourian were working overtime – the way that words are used and delivered in each moment speaks bounds more about the characters than an essay could hope to encompass.

If the philosophers are right and the arts spur empathy, English will make the world a better place. As for studying the language…that depends how you do it.

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English runs through August 18 at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, MN.

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Basil Considine

Basil Considine was the Editor of the Twin Cities Arts Reader from 2018-2022. He served as Performing Arts Editor and Senior Classical Music and Drama Critic for the Arts Reader's first five years, before succeeding Hanne Appelbaum. He was previously the Resident Classical Music and Drama Critic at the Twin Cities Daily Planet and remains an occasional contributing writer for The Boston Musical Intelligencer and The Chattanoogan. He holds a PhD in Music and Drama from Boston University, an MTS in Sacred Music from the BU School of Theology, and a BA in Music and Theatre from the University of San Diego.

Basil was named one of Musical America's 30 Professionals of the Year in 2017. He was previously the Regional Governor for the National Opera Association's North Central Region and the 2021-2022 U.S. Fulbright Faculty Scholar to Madagascar.

Latest posts by Basil Considine (see all)

• REVIEW: Moving, Funny, Striking English (Guthrie Theater) - July 22, 2024
• REVIEW: The Time for Newsies is Now (Artistry) - July 21, 2024
• PREVIEW: Behind the Story – Before Out of the Box Opera’s Suor Angelica - June 24, 2024