Here There Are Blueberries arrives on Broadway with the kind of premise that is impossible to shake. Built around a real cache of Auschwitz photographs, this unsettling production transforms archival discovery into a gripping theatrical investigation, making the Here There Are Blueberries Broadway review less about simple praise or criticism and more about why this story feels essential right now.
Now playing at the Barrymore Theatre, the Pulitzer finalist docu-drama first earned acclaim Off Broadway, and its Broadway transfer confirms its power. Conceived and directed by Moisés Kaufman and co-written with Amanda Gronich, the play uses documentary theater techniques to examine a set of candid Nazi-era photos donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2007. What follows is part mystery, part moral reckoning, and part meditation on memory, complicity, and the chilling ordinariness of evil.
Here There Are Blueberries Broadway Review: What the Play Is About
At the center of Here There Are Blueberries is archivist Rebecca Erbelding, portrayed by Delia Cunningham, who receives an unexpected offer: a WWII photo album unlike any the museum has seen before. Rather than documenting prisoners or liberation, the images show Nazi officers and camp staff in moments of leisure near Auschwitz, including scenes at a nearby retreat where they relaxed, socialized, and celebrated.
That contrast is the engine of the production. The photographs reveal not only who these people were, but how routine atrocity could become for those living beside it. The play’s title comes from a caption on one of the photos, turning an innocent phrase into something deeply disturbing once its context becomes clear.
This Here There Are Blueberries Broadway review would be incomplete without noting that the show is structured like an investigation. The museum team studies the album to determine:
- Who took the photographs
- Who appears in them
- How the album survived the fall of the Nazi regime
- What the images reveal about everyday participation in genocide
That procedural framework keeps the 90-minute production moving, even as its deeper questions linger long after the curtain call.
A Riveting Cast Anchors the Historical Investigation
One of the production’s greatest strengths is its ensemble. Kathleen Chalfant brings gravity and intelligence to the stage, while Delia Cunningham gives the archivist’s journey a human pulse. Michael Cerveris, Conrad Ricamora, Michelle Beck, Scott Barrow, Montego Glover, and Brandon Flynn all contribute to a seamless company performance in which actors shift between multiple roles and perspectives.
Flynn, in particular, makes a major impact in a later section of the play, when descendants of those connected to the photographs begin to speak. These scenes give Here There Are Blueberries its sharpest dramatic edge. Instead of remaining a museum-room procedural, the production expands into an examination of inherited guilt, denial, family silence, and the struggle to confront historical truth.
In any Here There Are Blueberries Broadway review, those testimony-driven sequences stand out as the moments when the play feels most alive and most urgent.
Why the Production Design Matters So Much
Documentary theater lives or dies by clarity, and this production understands that. Derek McLane’s stark scenic design evokes an archival workspace, with tall desks and spare surroundings that keep attention on the evidence. David Bengali’s projections are especially crucial, allowing the audience to inspect the same photographs as the characters. The effect is intimate, unsettling, and immersive.
Lighting and sound deepen the atmosphere without overwhelming it. The mood is one of mounting dread, not melodrama. Because the source material is already so potent, restraint becomes a strength.
Key production elements that elevate the show include:
- Projections: essential for turning static historical images into active evidence
- Set design: clean and functional, reinforcing the research setting
- Lighting: measured and haunting rather than flashy
- Sound design: subtle support for tension and emotional weight
Where the Play Excels — and Where It Feels Slightly Uneven
No honest Here There Are Blueberries Broadway review should ignore the fact that the material itself sometimes overshadows the dramaturgy. The real-life photo album is so extraordinary, so morally and historically loaded, that the play occasionally struggles to match its force. At moments, some thematic revelations feel familiar rather than newly illuminating, especially for audiences already versed in Holocaust scholarship and the concept often described as the banality of evil.
There are also stretches where the script seems to build suspense around questions that feel less dramatically complex than intended. Still, these are relatively small reservations when set against the larger accomplishment. The production remains intelligent, absorbing, and emotionally devastating in its best scenes.
What matters most is that Here There Are Blueberries never lets the audience keep a comfortable distance. It asks viewers to look closely at how bureaucracy, routine, and self-justification can coexist with unimaginable violence.
Why Here There Are Blueberries Feels Essential on Broadway
Broadway often celebrates spectacle, but this production proves that confrontation can be just as theatrical. The show does not depend on elaborate plotting or sentimental uplift. Instead, it trusts history, testimony, and the act of looking. That confidence gives it unusual weight.
For theatergoers interested in historical drama, Holocaust remembrance, documentary performance, or morally serious storytelling, this is one of the most important plays currently on stage. This Here There Are Blueberries Broadway review ultimately lands on the same conclusion many audiences likely will: even when the play shows minor structural limitations, its cumulative impact is undeniable.
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Final Verdict
The strongest takeaway from this Here There Are Blueberries Broadway review is that the play succeeds because it refuses simplification. It is haunting, thought-provoking, and often riveting, using one extraordinary historical artifact to expose larger truths about memory, denial, and human complicity. Broadway does not often make room for work this rigorous and unsettling, and that alone makes it worth seeing. If you are looking for theater that challenges as much as it moves, Here There Are Blueberries is a production that demands attention.
