Reviews
A curated sampling of the critical responses to my books and plays. Poetry and short story collections list their corresponding publishers; plays note the relevant producing company and/or theater.
Fassbinder: His Movies, My Poems (2024)
Anxiety Press
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"Creative, memorable, and thought-provoking, this poetic salute impressively appreciates the genre-spanning oeuvre of a multi-talented, theatrical German cinematographer." - Jim Piechota, Bay Area Reporter
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"Pisarra makes this book encompassing and relevant via robust craft, smarts, and compelling poetic storytelling." - Vikram Bondai, Hamilton Arts & Letters
Periodic Boyfriends (2023)
Capturing Fire Press
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"The poems run the gamut from sneakily humorous to outright hilarity to loss and longing, and sometimes encompass all of the above in a single entry." - Puma Perl, Chelsea Community News
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"Rabelaisian, witty, wistful and intelligent, Drew Pisarra’s poems are a delight to read. The very conceit of this collection – atomic love – is slick, brainy, and inspired." - Charles Rammelkamp, London Grip
You're Pretty Gay (2021)
Chaffinch Press
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"A goldmine of plot lines, characters, and narratives confront the limiting and pervasive structures of heteronormativity and gender role conditioning." - Elizabeth Hoover, Fourteen Hills
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"...subverts our expectations of what a book focused on the queer experience should be and shows us that in serious topics there can still be fun." - J.L. Corbett, Idle Ink
Infinity Standing Up (2019)
Capturing Fire Press
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"The poems in Infinity Standing Up (Capturing Fire Press) are brazen and lusty and often amusing..." - Elizabeth Lund, The Washington Post
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"If Shakespeare and Cole Porter had a love child it would be Pisarra." - Kathi Wolfe, The Washington Blade
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"These poems are clever , amusing more than fraught, and bend the form in ways I wouldn’t have thought possible." - Alan Catlin, Misfit Magazine
Publick Spanking (1996)
Future Tense Books
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"Cruising on the edge of polite literature, Publick Spanking makes the taboo seem acceptable and the mundane seem mysterious." - Willamette Week
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"A mesmerizing stylist, Pisarra unites forms of the short story, the essay, and poetry to invoke enchanting starkness." - Puck Magazine
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"Pisarra’s peculiar gift is the ability to switch from the brutally real to the world of dreams in a heartbeat." - PDXS
Price in Purgatory: A Live Radio Play (2023)
Fresh Fruit Festival
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The play is both hysterically funny and intensely thought-provoking as it debates what makes a person either worthy of heaven, better off in hell, and the purpose of existence on both sides of the veil." - Jim Catapano, Arts Independent
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"The show is extremely entertaining even for those without a taste for horror. It honors Price and his career while lovingly poking fun." - Callie Stribling, Showtones
My Bedroom Is an Installation (2023)
Imago Theatre
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"...the play is gleefully impenetrable—impish in the way it bends its own rules, reverent in its love of the bizarre. It’s a triumph from a company that succeeds by risking failure." - Bennett Campbell Ferguson, Willamette Week
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"Experiencing this show can make you feel as bent as sleep deprivation, without any of the negative effects. It’s absolutely one to see – even if you have to stay up past your bed time." - Marty Hughley, Oregon Arts Watch
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(This play was co-written by Jerry Mouawad)
Click (2023)
The Tank NYC
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"Click echoes Breathless in its central couple embroiled in both illicit activity and an unsettled relationship, but rather than producing an homage filled with cigarette smoking and sexual philosophizing, Click folds that inspiration into a unique, atmospheric, and surprising variation of the genre with which Godard too was playing." - John R. Ziegler and Leah Richards, Thinking Theater NYC
Voiceover (2022)
Imago Theatre
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"...fascinating, funny and philosophically frightening." - Marty Hughley, Oregon ArtsWatch
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"Voiceover was a decidedly meta exploration of the inner and outer workings of theater and performance....a quirky and delightful production." - Darleen Ortega, The Portland Observer
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(This play was co-written by Jerry Mouawad)
The Strange Case of Nick M. (2021)
Imago Theatre / KBOO FM
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"Pisarra’s story is out on the edge, somewhere in that Beckett-like territory where comedy and tragedy and pure performance dexterity meet... Pisarra & company keep things playful, speculative, entertaining, tickling the audience around the edges of consciousness." - Bob Hicks, Oregon ArtsWatch