American film and theater critic Stanley Kauffmann reviewed the play when it premiered in 1966 at the Helen Hayes Theater. He opined that the play "moves along mostly in one plane of intensity and progress, and as a lyric of poignancy, it lacks edge". He said Hilton Edwards direction is "workmanlike, but it is a disappointment". In the end, Kauffmann argues that "despite the good work of most of the actors, it is Mr. Friel who lets us down. Not by trickery or fakery, but simply by naïveté in art. There is considerable pleasantness, little poetry and insufficient power in his play".[13]
American Broadway theatre critic Walter Kerr reviewed the play as well in 1966 at its premiere. He said it was a "funny play, a prickly play, finally a most affecting play, and the pleasure it gives is of a most peculiar kind". He opined that Friel has "written a play about an ache, and he has written it so simply and so honestly that the ache itself becomes a warming fire".[4]
In 2004, at its premiere at the Millennium Forum in Derry, Northern Ireland, Jane Coyle wrote in The Irish Times, that Adrian Dunbar has "shone a beam into the dark corners of the play and has crafted an intensely unsettling and emotionally charged evening." She also pointed out that it was Dunbar's directing debut, and "the strain showed in some crucial scenes", and that there is "still work to be done".[14]
In 2007, Patrick Lonergan, Professor of Drama and Theatre Studies at National University of Ireland, wrote that the play has had "lasting significance; it was Friel's first international success, and the play's greatest significance is probably its ongoing popularity with audiences, which can be explained by Friel's skillful combination of humor with a serious treatment of the pain of a young man forced to emigrate".[15]
In 2021, at its premiere at the Cork Opera House in Ireland, Marjorie Brennan reviewed the play for the Irish Examiner. In her view, the play is a "classic of Irish theatre and a well-judged choice for Cork Opera House’s post-lockdown reawakening." She praised producer Patrick Talbot, director Geoff Gould and the cast, for "pulling off such a confident and entertaining full-scale production, a poignant and timely reminder of our need for connection and how we often struggle to articulate it".[16]
