“KENREX” Tightens Its Grip Off-Broadway at the Lucille Lortel – front mezz junkies, Theater News

The Off-Broadway Review: Jack Holden’s solo tour de force gains new intensity in a tighter, more volatile space

By Ross

“You know how this works,” she says, as the reel-to-reel begins to turn, pulling us into the story of Ken Rex McElroy. I did know how this all worked. I had seen KENREX before, in London, and carried that memorable experience with me into the Lucille Lortel Theatre. What I did not expect was how quickly that familiarity would give way to something more immediate, more physical, more electric. That wildly fulfilling adrenaline returned without hesitation, rising in tandem with that first pulse of sound, as if the story itself refused to settle into history. Even with its twists and outcomes already clearly mapped out in my mind, the experience felt newly volatile, as though the walls around it had closed in and sharpened the tension tenfold.

At the Lortel, this British import trades the openness of The Other Palace‘s thrust stage for a more contained proscenium, and that shift alters the way this story enters our body and soul. The darkness of the space merges with the play’s own sense of dread, creating an environment that feels sealed and inescapable. The black walls do not simply house the action; they absorb it, funnelling the energy and sending it out with greater force. Sound moves differently here. The blast of guitar does not drift; it hits, reverberates, and ignites the body.

The stage, designed by Anisha Fields (RSC’s King Lear), resembles a stripped-down sound stage. Numerous microphones on stands ring a large reel-to-reel tape recorder, creating a wide playing space that allows the wild and incomparable Jack Holden (Almeida’s The Line of Beauty) to command the room with his astonishing kinetic energy and appeal. Initially, we hear a recorded interview between an FBI investigator (voiced by Kelly Bruke) and David Baird, an out-of-town district attorney, recounting a shooting death in Skidmore, Missouri, a town so small it does not even have its own sheriff. As the recording continues to play, Holden gradually takes control of the narrative, slipping seamlessly from tape to live presence, asking the igniting question that drives the piece forward: “Where does this story begin?“

‘911, what’s your emergency?’
‘
‘Oh god, oh my god, he’s dead… My husband… they shot him… they all did.’

And so it begins. Jack Holden’s performance, which just won him and the show a number of Olivier Awards, sits at the electrifying centre, and it remains an astonishing feat of control, stamina, and transformation shaped by the precise sound design of Giles Thomas (IRT’s Disco Pigs) and the sharp lighting and video work created by Joshua Pharo (RSC’s Measure for Measure). Holden dives headfirst into the role. He skips, stalks, and dances across the space with a feral country music energy that never feels indulgent. Moving rapidly between dozens of characters, he reshapes his body with such precision that entire figures emerge without the need for explanation. His Ken Rex carries a menace that is instantly recognizable, a shift in posture and presence that tightens the room around him. Other characters flicker in and out through gesture and rhythm, each one distinct, each one contributing to the mounting sense of a town under pressure. The expressive and circling physicality of Holden does not simply illustrate the story; it drives it forward, giving weight to every turn and escalation.

The production’s design deepens that immersion. The frantic energy of the staging, paired with the relentless drive of the live music and score by John Patrick Elliott (Apollo’s Cruise) and the ferocious direction of Ed Stambollouian (West End’s Night School), creates a landscape that feels both immediate and overwhelming. Elliott’s live music runs alongside the action like a radio blaring from an open pickup truck window. Rock and country bleed into moments of visceral brutality and dread, reinforcing how violence becomes normalized when fear is allowed to fester. The drumming and guitar undercurrent push the narrative forward with a sharp-edged urgency that never lets up. Within the Lortel’s lower ceilings, that momentum feels concentrated, almost compressed, as if the story is pressing in from all sides. When voices emerge, whether from a choir-like swell or the quiet murmur of barroom conversation, they seem to surround us entirely. It becomes difficult to locate a single source, and instead the sensation takes hold that we are inside the town itself, sitting among its people, caught in the same vulnerability and slow erosion of certainty.

That sense of collective presence is central to how the story unfolds. Structured in chapters with titles like “The Town,” “The Bully,” and “The Lawyer,” the script by Holden and Stambollouian carefully assembles a portrait of a community living under the volatile rule of McElroy. This is a community worn down over time, shaped by fear, frustration, and the long wait for justice that never arrives. The tension does not spike all at once. It accumulates, building through small moments and quiet recognitions until it reaches a point where release feels both inevitable and deeply unsettling. The production captures that gradual shift with precision, allowing the audience to feel the weight of that waiting, the strain of holding onto systems that no longer seem capable of protecting those who want to rely on them.

Returning to KENREX in this new space does not simply revisit a story already told. It reconfigures how that story is experienced, tightening its grip and intensifying its impact. The familiarity of the narrative becomes part of the tension itself, sitting alongside the immediacy of the performance and the physicality of the staging. Sitting there, with the sound and smoke pressing in and engulfing us, the figures take on a different shape. The question is no longer about what happens next. It is about how it takes over our body, captivating us within a pressure that builds, and builds until it finally breaks its electric connection, falling away into a deadly silence.