[In "Semmelweiss"] Howard Sackler has taken the life story of Ignaz Phillipp Semmelweiss …, the pioneer Hungarian physician, and transformed it into the spell-binding evening of theater.

On its very simplest level, Mr. Sackler's new play is a medical melodrama…. But given the playwright's talent …, "Semmelweiss" becomes something greater.

It is a classic story of conscience versus compromise, the individual combating convention. The play is not only about one courageous doctor, but also about all visionaries who have been brutalized for their ideas. Mr. Sackler's Semmelweiss is, in short, a legitimate hero and, finally, a martyr….

Mr. Sackler is, of course, the author of "The Great White Hope."… In "Semmelweiss," Mr. Sackler uses a related approach. This is not a historical pageant, but a theatricalized interpretation…. [The drama] is developed in a tightly meshed long skein of encounters. There are three unrelenting acts, and an enormous cast which becomes a chorus of antagonism. Like Mr. Sackler's Jack Johnson, Semmelweiss is alone in a dilemma that rises in urgency….

In the nine years since "The Great White Hope" it seemed that Mr. Sackler might be one of our many one-play American dramatists, who fail to equal their initial success. "Semmelweiss" makes it clear that Mr. Sackler is not only a playwright of stature, but an artist of maturity and vision…. It is a play that should endure.