Playwright Josh Luxenberg, director Joshua William Gelb, and performer Jon Levin… bring an unflagging sense of theatrical invention that, even if you well remember the original [Kafka] story, provides a nonstop sense of surprise. So delightful and original is this trio's approach that I don't want to spoil it for you; safe to say, however, that A Hunger Artist begins as a riotous vaudeville and darkens by degrees as the title character descends into melancholy and squalor.

The production team creates one startling image after another, while retaining the story's teasing resonance: Is this a parable of the artist's destructive relationship to the audience? A study of man's (and, perhaps, capitalism's) inherent exploitation? An exercise in flesh-creeping for its own sake? Any and all could be true; in any case, this is one production that is hard to shake off.

Kafka's story is eerily compelling on its own, but it isn't a slam dunk for a stage adaptation, given its largely passive lead character and his doomed trajectory. Fortunately, Levin, Luxenberg, and Gelb have plenty of stage magic at their command, seducing us with comedy before dragging us willingly into the hunger artist's seedy, isolated existence. Later on, you may want to discuss what it is all about; watching it, you'll be too spellbound to ask questions.

—Lighting and Sound America, David Barbour