Tiger Style!
Theatreworks Silicon Valley
The play is a tour de force of comic actors at the top of their game. Dao and Nelson, who just recently completed another run together in San Francisco, build upon their effective chemistry here. Dao’s comic sensibilities and uncanny physical machinations play well against the foil that is Nelson, whose explosions carry a more reserved tone, but no less effective.
the batting average (of jokes) is quite high, a tribute to the comic timing that each performer possesses.
-David John Chávez, Mercury News
The characterizations are vivid and larger than life (this is satire, after all), but nothing is meanspirited, nor does anyone take the easy road by going all soft and sentimental in the end… Will Dao as Albert and Jenny Nguyen Nelson as Jennifer make a believable pair of bickering sibs with a complicated history and navigate the more petulant aspects of their characters with aplomb, never alienating the audience.
-Jim Munson, Broadway World
TheatreWorks Silicon Valley's production of Mike Lew's Tiger Style! is a crackling, laugh-out-loud satire bordering on total farce, where the stereotypes that are faced by two third-generation Chinese American siblings are given a fast-paced and irreverent lashing and thrashing exposure. With performances by a cast of five who at times seem to be in a reality TV show's competition of who can be more outrageously funny than the others, Tiger Style! as directed by TheatreWorks' own Jeffrey Lo is on the surface an outlandishly hilarious romp… Jenny Nguyen Nelson and Will Dao deliciously and dynamically portray a duo of self-centered, spoiled-with-the-best-of-everything siblings. Mike Lew's script provides a Pandora's box of opportunities for each individually and for them together as a twosome to leave us in stitches over and over.
-Eddie Reynolds, Theatre Eddys
Poor Yella Rednecks: Vietgone 2
ACT SAn Francisco
Nguyen envisions Tong (Jenny Nguyen Nelson) and Quang with qualities that our stages still too rarely give characters of color. In their dingy apartment in Arkansas in 1981, they swagger like cowboys and comic book superheroes. The actors soar. Nelson sets a scene’s whole energy just with her posture, and she escalates and de-escalates emotion with beat-by-beat thoughtfulness and precision. Watching her, you always think, “Yes, that’s exactly what it feels like.”
-Lily Janiak, SF chronicle
Nothing is subtle about what Tong is feeling or thinking at any given moment. Jenny Nguyen Nelson gives a powerhouse performance in the role of a young woman who exudes determination to forge her own route to survival and eventual success in this land still foreign in so many ways. At one point she explosively raps with vigor, “I’m not just pretty, my brain is damn witty … While the rest are dreaming, I’m always scheming.” Tong is a take-charge, take-no-prisoners do-er who declares, “I’m done being lost; I’m too ready for direction.” [When] we meet her as a seventy-year-old as her son solicits her help in telling him her story, she is clear that her story is to be told “true and hard” – words that describe the approach Jenny Nguyen Nelson brings throughout in her stunning depiction of Qui’s mother, Tong.
-Eddie Reynolds, Theater Eddys
Mr. Burns A Post-Electric Play
Brown/Trinity
“The actors (all 2023 MFA students) bring the story to vivid life, with each providing both solid ensemble work and star turns. The whole cast is baseline brilliant: they are intensely there in every moment, bringing deeply lived authentic reality in the first two acts and totally committed to the hallucinatory vision of the third. It is such a finely crafted set of interlocking performances. Jenny Nguyen Nelson offers us a stunning vision of Bart-as-iconic-hero. By itself, the third act of this production -- which is mostly sung through, with lyrics by Washburn -- is among the finest works of theater this reviewer has ever seen. It is take-the-top-of-your-head-off brilliant and you will savor every moment.”
-John McDaid, Broadway World
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
California Shakespeare Theater. Orinda
“The entire cast of 10, all playing multiple roles, seamlessly shifts from character to character and nimbly handles their dialogue. Their crisp articulation make[s] the play's language surprisingly easy to hear and follow given its kitchen sinkful of storylines.
Jenny Nelson and Dean Linnard turn in particularly sly comic performances: Nelson's Hermia, the show's central female love interest, strikes a funny balance between romance and entitlement.”
- Jim Gladstone, The Bay Area Reporter
“All the actors add significantly to the comedic impact of the play:[…] Jenny Nelson, who goes from a touching Hermia to a hilarious member of the workers' team...”
- Sophie Braccini, Lamorinda Weekly
“The verve with which Lysander loves Hermia (hilarious Jenny Nelson) is palpable.”
- Michael V. Rodriguez, Theatrius
Everybody
California Shakespeare Theater. Orinda
"All of the talented members of the ensemble bring a wonderful amount of life and depth (no pun intended) to their roles as the personified concepts Everybody leaves behind. I hate to single anyone out, but I’d be remiss not mention Jenny Nelson, who this show performed as 'Stuff', the personification of material items. Nelson perfectly tread the line between 'sincere' and “sarcastic”, making it all her own in the best possible way. All in all, great performances from a strong ensemble."
- TheThinkingMansIdiot
"Stuff (marvelous Vanna White-spoof by Jenny Nelson)..."
- Lou Fancher, SF Examiner
" 'EVERYBODY' SPEAKS BOLDLY, BEAUTIFULLY, AT CAL SHAKES, ORINDA… Five Somebodies are brilliantly portrayed… Jenny Nelson entrances as a self-involved 'Stuff' in her gee-gaws, and she plays 'Senses,' with a witty lilt."
- Barry David Horwitz, Theatrius
Lobster, Actually
Killing My Lobster
“The opening sketch revolves around two detectives (Nelson and Gavin) attempting to untangle the complicated web that is the films’ interlocking relationships. Later on, Nelson takes on the persona of a bored Staples dealing with an endless stream of unhealthy stalkers romantic men looking for cue cards and markers. Later still, Nelson becomes the meek employee at the office Xmas party going through the very disastrous do’s and don’ts of the evening…
Jenny Nelson shows a wonderfully wide range, bouncing from hard-nosed detective to obnoxious millennial to meek office work with ease.”
-TheThinkingMansIdiot