SOURCE: Winn, Steven. “All Hot and Bothered over Porno.” The San Francisco Chronicle (9 October 2000): F3.

In the following mixed review of Hot’n’ Throbbing, Winn maintains that Vogel's “strong subject matter gets squandered on a crude, oddly listless piece of theater.”

Playwright Paula Vogel has never been afraid to speak up about the unmentionable. She dealt with her brother's death from AIDS in The Baltimore Waltz, lampooned a suburban terrorist in The Mineola Twins and saw the tender side of a child molester in How I Learned to Drive.

In her recently revised 1985 drama Hot’N’ Throbbing, which opened over the weekend at Venue 9, pornography, domestic violence and sexual objectification get an 85-minute workout. There's no denying the power of Vogel's material, especially when a romantic reunion curdles into brutality in a disturbing climax.

But the strong subject matter gets squandered on a crude, oddly listless piece of...