Dirty Blonde received mixed reviews from critics. Ben Brantley, in the New York Times, was enthusiastic. In his January 11, 2000, review, he wrote after the play's opening night off-Broadway that Dirty Blonde was a “wonderfully warmblooded . . . smart, tough and tenderhearted comedy,” which makes a “persuasive and entertaining case for stargazing as healthy exercise.”

Brantley points out that the characters Jo and Charlie use their obsessions not to take them away from reality but to understand themselves and to connect with each other. Jo and Charlie also understand the nature of their idol. They are not merely star-struck; they see the “woman, both monstrous and human, behind the gloriously vulgar screen siren.” According to Brantley, it is this double focus—on Mae West and on her two twenty-first century fans—that gives the play its strength and raises it above the usual theater fare about a dead celebrity...