Jeff Daniels performs a scene from 'To Kill a Mockingbird' | Live from Here with Chris Thile 

From a native Michigander.

Me too!

Same! The play was fantastic! Superb, superb, superb!

JeevesReturns No it isn’t. As Daniels has said , this is a new character, and he is the original performer. NOTHING about this Atticus is the same. For one thing, this is Aaron Sorkin’s Atticus,so he likes to hear himself talk so he says a LOT more . For another - if you actually watch Peck again - both his style and accent are COMPLETELY different. Peck’s cadence is slow, and he makes little effort to affect a southern accent. In these regards, Daniels is thoroughly believable: his accent is excellent, and his rhythm is both faster and more complex than Peck’s. This Atticus is a *storyteller* - Sorkin has transferred the Mockingbird story to *the courtroom* - just in case Americans don’t understand that the jury is about to kill a mockingbird - Sorkin caNOT stop preaching so he made his Atticus a preacher. This is not to say Daniels isn’t great - he is - he is the best man for Sorkin’s sensibility and he does a great job. But this is a genuinely re-imagined story : it is not an adaptation of the novel, as the movie was. It adds scenes and changes text to a degree that changes what the characters bring to the audience. There’s the book. There’s the film: 2 varieties of apple. And there’s this play, which is closer to an Orange.

rukeyser Did you wake up and say “today I’ll be an overly opinionated asshole anonymously online to someone I’ve never met or will meet”?

For me -- 7th row, Tim. BUT (!), it was Ed Harris on my birthday (Jan 18th) AND my first-ever Broadway experience

Bud, I'm a Brit and feel for you. I am white, not the kind, like that policeman. What I saw was unbelievable, the cop using his badge as a shield to commit murder. not only him either, because his other "officers" were as guilty as him. They did nothing to stop him, they knew exactly what was happening. It was happening because he was Black. I am ashamed of our American friends, who apply the law only against Blacks. Your prisons prove that.

I must say, my first thought was that it seems rushed.

Richard Wyant “THEY” is Aaron Sorkin. That changes EVERYTHING: the characters, the scenes, the story. The movie adapted a story by Harper Lee. This play is a story written by Aaron Sorkin: imagine David Mamet rewriting Alice in Wonderland ;-)

It's actually the neighbor, Miss Maudie, who says that.

he's not reading from the book

Atticus said to Jem one day, “I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.”

So you don't like it... Please see peck's performance in the movie. He too did not have the classic southern drawl that most male of the south utter.

Carolyn Brown Here’s my comment to a guy who called this performance and play a tribute to a great actor and story: No it isn’t. As Daniels has said , this is a new character, and he is the original performer. NOTHING about this Atticus is the same. For one thing, this is Aaron Sorkin’s Atticus,so he likes to hear himself talk so he says a LOT more . For another - if you actually watch Peck again - both his style and accent are COMPLETELY different. Peck’s cadence is slow, and he makes little effort to affect a southern accent. In these regards, Daniels is thoroughly believable: his accent is excellent, and his rhythm is both faster and more complex than Peck’s. This Atticus is a *storyteller* - Sorkin has transferred the Mockingbird story to *the courtroom* - just in case Americans don’t understand that the jury is about to kill a mockingbird - Sorkin caNOT stop preaching so he made his Atticus a preacher. This is not to say Daniels isn’t great - he is - he is the best man for Sorkin’s sensibility and he does a great job. But this is a genuinely re-imagined story : it is not an adaptation of the novel, as the movie was. It adds scenes and changes text to a degree that changes what the characters bring to the audience. There’s the book. There’s the film: 2 varieties of apple. And there’s this play, which is closer to an Orange.