Ayo Edebiri in 'Proof' review: Broadway revival doesn't add up

By Matthew Wexler

It’s been over 25 years since Proof, David Auburn’s Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning play about a family’s reckoning over the death of their mathematician father, his mental health, and the legacy he left behind, first arrived on Broadway. But producers of a new revival may have miscalculated their leads’ ability to catapult Auburn’s technical language off the page.

Despite all the math jargon (and there’s plenty), Proof explores the devastating effects of grief, the guilt we may feel after a loved one’s passing, and the fear of becoming our parents. Excavating the visceral from the logical requires a deft command of language, body, and mind.

Dr. Keith Devlin describes proofs as “stories that convince suitably qualified others that a certain statement is true.” Leave it to a Stanford mathematician to find the heart of the matter.

Famous faces, fragile math

Ayo Edebiri (The Bear) plays Catherine, an exhausted 25-year-old processing her father Robert’s passing (Don Cheadle). He appears first in a dreamlike scene on the eve of Catherine’s birthday, then later in flashbacks as she attempts to reconcile his loss and her own mental health struggles. Despite top billing and a major marketing push, Cheadle’s role recedes for most of the first act and feels like producer gameplay rather than the play’s fuel.

Kara Young arrives on the scene with a much-needed boost of energy and momentum as older sister Claire, a practical and domineering sibling, using her wealth to make amends for extricating herself from her father’s latter years.

Kara Young and Ayo Edebiri in "Proof." — Kara Young and Ayo Edebiri in “Proof.” Photo by Matthew Murphy.

And what’s a math play without a math geek? Jin Ha brings an awkward warmth to Hal, one of their father’s former students, who’s also romantically interested in Catherine. He’s almost too easy to trust, which gives his intentions around archiving over a hundred of Robert’s notebooks a subtle, dramatic tension.

Thomas Kail’s production plays out on Teresa L. Williams’ backyard set, trimmed with Amanda Zieve’s linear transitional lighting that feels a bit on the nose for familiar chalkboard problem-solving. But the bigger issue is Edebiri’s strained performance, which feels trapped in the actor’s throat, only to explode in a few moments of visible direction. And despite Ha’s soft charisma, the pair’s chemistry feels dutiful to the script rather than an authentic connection.

Proof’s original production became one of the longest-running Broadway plays of the 21st century. Maybe some memories are best left in the past.