Sample reviews from London, Broadway and Off Broadway

"As Bottom in "Midsummer Night's Dream" - as Costard in "Love's Labours Lost" - 
as Launcelot Gobbo in "The Merchant of Venice" and Autolycus in "The Winter's Tale",
Jim Dale is God's gift to Shakespeare comedies."

Laurence Olivier
British National Theatre at the 
Old Vic 1972

"Barnum"     
   Directed by Joe Layton   St. James Theatre    New York 1981

 
Headline - "Jim Dale is Toast of Broadway, 
his performance was a display of consummate showmanship"   Michiko Kakutani    “New York Times”
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"Jim Dale is a one-man, three-ring, four star circus. 
He is a knockout, a great performer. 
Many comedians pratfall, but Dale freefalls!"  

Reviewer   Clive Barnes    “ New York Post”
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Is there anything that Jim Dale can't do? 
Last night he roared into town in this new musical 
and showed off enough tricks to make all but a Houdini dizzy. 
He transforms a gargantuan circus of a show into his own joyous playground."

Reviewer    Frank Rich     New York Times
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"Scapino"    
 Directed by Frank Dunlop - Circle in the Square, New York 1974

"In Scapino, Jim Dale is one of the five or six funniest comedians I have ever seen, 
and if I should be granted a dying wish, it would be for a command performance by him - 
so I could die laughing!”

Reviewer   John Simon   “New York  Magazine”
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"Jim Dale, actor, singer, dancer, acrobat, vaudevillian, composer 
may very well be one of the most talented and certainly the funniest comedians in the annals of the theatre. 
Special trains should be put on to bring people into New York from all over the country just to see Dale ........”Reviewer Myron Galloway “ Montreal Star”
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"Jim Dale is the most brilliant lunatic on Broadway since Bert Lahr, 
and his star-billing in "Scapino" merely reflects the finest review of any season, any time!" 
Reporter  Jack O'Brian       “ New York ”

"The National Health"    
   Directed by Michael Blakemore  National Theatre, Old Vic, London 1971   
                                                                                        
"As the play began, a curly-haired scarecrow of an actor danced out onto the stage 
and proceeded to do an outrageous vaudeville routine about cadavers and bedpans, about doctors and death. 
Wearing an oversize orderly's smock he darted all over the set, pinching nurses and twirling hospital carts, lobbing his lines like hand grenades into every pocket of the theatre.
And improbable as it sounds he made his macabre spiel seem funny. 
In a matter of minutes a grim National Health ward started to look like a circus. 
The audience knew that it was in the presence of a galvanic talent. 
His name - I committed it to memory at once - was Jim Dale"    

Reviewer   Frank Rich  New York Times
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"Then there is the incomparable Jim Dale as Barnet, 
I'm not sure Mr. Dale isn't the best comic actor we have." 

Reviewer  B.A. Young , London Financial Times

"The Comedians"   
  Directed by Edward Perone  Mark Taper Forum, L.A.

 “And it is actor Jim Dale's garishly physical, socially assaulting semi-mime and wholly private, 
demon-fed performance of a talent so individual and brilliantly frightening 
that he scares agents and others away,  that momentarily bedazzles this otherwise ensemble production"  

Reviewer   Ray Loynd   “ L.A. Herald Examiner” 
**

Reviewer       Frederick Ross         “Drama Logue”
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"Jim Dale's galvanic stage presence as the most gifted of the students Gethin Price, 
reaches it's climax in the second act. It begins humorously, ends violently, and is throughout brilliant."

Reviewer   Patricia Burr        “South Pasadena Review”

"Joe Egg"   
   Directed by Arvin Brown  Longacre Theatre, New York


"Performers are supposed to appreciate fine acting more than civilians, 
so I'd advise you to beg, borrow or steal any available ticket to "Joe Egg". 
Jim Dale and Stockard Channing are giving the best performances of their career. 
Their performances are a lesson and example to actors of every caliber."  

  Reviewer   Michael Sommers       "Backstage" 
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 Welcome the arrival of "Joe Egg" 
starring the spectacular duo of Stockard Channing and Jim Dale. 
I have seen many people play the role of Bri, but no one has quite encompassed its range, 
from rage to impotence, from mockery to despair, like Dale .
He is matched at every point by the wonderful loving Miss Channing. 
You won't see better performances than these two this season."  

Reviewer  Clive Barnes New York Post

  “Privates on Parade”   
 Directed by by Larry Carpenter  Roundabout


"Given a vital actor like Jim Dale, and an audience will know instantly 
that it is experiencing theater  -  in the best and most magical sense of the word. 
For however long we've been dutifully going to the theater, 
hoping and hoping (and failing) to see the real thing, we recognize it at once when it appears. 
For Mr. Dale 'Privates on Parade' is an acting coup......"  

Reviewer Laurie Winer "Theater"

"Travels With My Aunt" 
 Directed by Giles Havergal  Minetta Lane NY  

"Only Mr. Dale plays the lustful Aunt Augusta . 
In a virtuoso performance that matches in economy of gesture and power of suggestion, 
Mr. Dale, with a tilt of the chin, a brush of the hand, a precise inflection, 
is conducting a master class in performing art."

Reviewer     Alvin Klein      “New York Times”

" Oliver !"     
   Directed by Sam Mendes         London Palladium

Reviewer     Jack Tinker        Daily Mail
"What a 24-carat asset Jim Dale is to the show. 
His rueful Fagin is a masterpiece - a feast of theatricality."

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"Even if you have to pick a pocket or two, 
get hold of a ticket to see Jim Dale's triumphant return to the West End stage.  
Dale has inherited the part of Fagin and this production has unquestionably leapt in stature as a consequence. 
It was Jim Dale's show, and for once the standing ovation - the sine qua non of most first night's - 
actually felt genuine." 

Reviewer Neil Smith "Theatre"