The River - Brossura

Eerily brilliant... Wonder and beauty suffuse it even as it darkens, at a pace almost musical... All of it is wrapped in marvellous language, sunset colours and moon shadows, muscular and glittering as an upstream trout... Extraordinary. The Times

Emotionally wired and deeply poetic...magical, bucolic, gothic and even sacramental...This is plainly the best new play in town. The Stage

Strange, eerie, tense ... endlessly mysterious... it leaves one unsure whether one is watching a ghost story, gothic thriller or parable... Confirms that Butterworth possesses a singular talent. Guardian

A subtly crafted piece of chamber music. It is teasing, haunting and hushed... beautifully written, "mixing memory with desire."... Butterworth's thrilling nature writing really sings. Telegraph

The River is pure magic. A magnetically eerie, luminously beautiful psychodrama about the changes that happen in dark places... A swirling mist of memory, magical realism and hinted-at folklore, bound by some terrific acting and the gorgeous bucolic lyricism of Butterworth's language. Time Out

If you did want to make comparisons with Jerusalem you could say that the longer play was violent dynamite-fishing, a great brawling splash throwing up all manner of deep monsters, whereas this is delicate: a fly-fisherman's piece of trickery, ripples and reflections. Its iridescent beauty and menacing hook hover just out of reach, so that we snap breathlessly up towards meaning, half-hungry, half-afraid. The Times

Spellbinding... Lyrical and tricksy, occasionally droll and ultimately desolating... unfolds like a tantalising cross between a piece of deeply felt poetry and a sleight-of-hand puzzle. Independent.

Bewitchingly strange, watery and wild but deftly crafted. --Evening Standard

Here's a puzzle play, alluring and unsettling in turn... marking Butterworth out anew as the most singular voice in town... sexy and sorrowful... the play pulsates with sexual possibility and declarations of love that get revised. --Arts Desk

The River is a piece of gorgeously sensitive writing, utterly beguiling in its subtle deconstruction of the way we conduct ourselves in relationships -the facades erected, the lies told, the declarations made, the pasts conveniently ignored... A play of luminous beauty, hauntingly affecting in its intimate surroundings. --oughttobeclownsblogspot.co.uk

Jez Butterworth's playwriting debut, Mojo, was staged at the Royal Court in 1995, and was acclaimed as 'one of the most dazzling Royal Court main stage debuts in years' (Time Out (London)). Since then his plays have been premiered at the Royal Court, at the Almeida Theatre and at the Atlantic Theater in New York. Jerusalem ran for two hit seasons in the West End, as well as on Broadway. His films include Birthday Girl, Fair Game and an adaptation of Mojo.