It's a dark play; people may not realize that going into it which might be why they don't like. I agree with liking the other writers you mentioned more than Sondheim.

I LOVE going to movies though we don't do it all that often -- just too expensive. So I'm usually a pretty forgiving audience. My sister gave us a movie gift card for Christmas, so we've gone to see The Hobbit and we're seeing this tomorrow. The other I want to see is Unbroken. It was a fantastic book; I hope the movie measures up, but one of my favorite former students reviewed it last night and he didn't say it was awful, but he was disappointed on a few fronts. He ISN'T a forgiving audience though, so I suspect it will also be fine for me.