Rip Van Winkle, or The Works

Richard Nelson uses the familiar tale of Rip Van Winkle as the basis for his epic study of American agrarian reform, the Industrial Revolution, and the labor movement.

.. .The play has a smart, engaging premise. Rip Van Winkle’s sleep and waking are used to frame a variety of themes: men and women, parents and children, alcoholism, superstition, and, above all, the battle between industry and agriculture in the social history of the Hudson Valley. The style is also interesting: a kind of terse Bondian dialogue in short Brechtian scenes which allow the audience to find its own path between two ends of an imaginative leap…

Erika Munk, The Village Voice