Neil Patrick Harris's Career Reinvention Continues With Hedwig On Broadway

Neil Patrick Harris might be best known as Barney Stinson, the legendary playboy from ‘How I Met Your Mother’, but currently the actor is reinventing himself on Broadway as the lead in Hedwig and the Angry Itch. You might have tales stories of him swearing at an audience member, but that was far from the really story to come out of the show’s opening week. Harris is earning rave reviews in the musical which, whilst being anything but traditional, is currently rocking up a storm on Broadway.

If the reviews are anything to go by, it seems that Harris has conquered any insecurities he might have had and is giving the performance of a lifetime. As The Hollywood Reporter writes, “Harris is beyond fabulous, holds nothing back and plays it any way but safe in Michael Mayer's exhilarating production”. Variety echoes the same sentiments in their review, saying it was “astonishing how polished a physical performance Harris gives”, and adding that the actor manages to “integrate about 30 years of rock musical styles”, which isn't easy. Perhaps the most complimentary assessment of Harris came from Ben Brantley writing in The New York Times, who said, “Harris is in full command of who he is and, most excitingly, what he has become with this performance. That's a bona fide Broadway star, the kind who can rule an audience with the blink of a sequinned eyelid."

By all accounts Hedwig and the Angry Itch seems a triumph for everyone involved, especially Neil Patrick Harris. Harris has always been one of television best acting talents, but twice in his career he has played roles which were so memorable he’s been at risk of never escaping them. His Broadway success will hopefully mean that Harris’s career will continue to flourish now that ‘How I Met Your Mother’ has taken it’s final bow. After Hedwig and the Angry Itch, he’s certainly proven that his talents can stretch way beyond the confinements of television sitcoms.

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