Rosalind Eleazar Wins Raves as Chris Rock's 'Misty Green'

Rosalind Eleazar is drawing rapturous reviews for playing the title character in "Misty Green," the new play from Chris Rock, now running with her at its center.

Critics have singled out her performance as a "humanly flawed" protagonist — the phrase doing heavy lifting in coverage of the production. Eleazar takes on a lead role written by Rock, the comedian making his mark as a playwright, and she's the one reviewers keep returning to.

What does this change for Eleazar?

She's already known to television audiences from "Slow Horses," the spy series where she plays a key member of the ensemble. A stage lead this warmly received gives her a different kind of credential: not part of a cast, but the reason people buy tickets.

The mechanism here is straightforward. A rapturous review cycle for a title role does two things at once — it sells the current run, and it moves an actor up the list for future leads, on stage and on screen.

For now, the concrete fact is the one critics agree on: Eleazar's "Misty Green" performance is the draw, and the reviews say so in print.