This Weekend’s Highlights:
Friday, February 17
Shirley Valentine, by Willy Russell, directed by Matthew Dunster, starring Sheridan Smith, opens at London’s Duke of York’s Theatre.
Sugar Daddy, written & performed by Sam Morrison, directed by Ryan Cunningham, opens at Off-Broadway’s SoHo Playhouse.
SpeakEasy Stage Company‘s Fairview, by Jackie Sibblies Drury, directed by Pascale Florestal, featuring Dom Carter, Lyndsay Allyn Cox, Yewande Odetoyinbo, and Victoria Omoregie, opens at Boston’s Calderwood Pavilion.
Under Construction – New Play Slam Fest opens at North Hollywood’s Road on Magnolia.
tick, tick… BOOM!, directed by Kari Hayter, featuring Ernesto Figueroa, Phillip J. Lewis, and Samantha M. Lawrence, opens at Long Beach’s International City Theatre.
Bad Cinderella, by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Emerald Fennell & David Zippel, directed by Laurence Connor, featuring Linedy Genao (Cinderella), Carolee Carmello (Stepmother), Grace McLean (Queen), Jordan Dobson (Sebastian), Morgan Higgins (Marie), Sami Gayle (Adele), Christina Acosta Robinson (Godmother), and Savy Jackson (Cinderella alternate), with Raymond Baynard, Michael Baerga, Lauren Boyd, Tristen Buettel, Kaleigh Cronin, Josh Drake, Ben Lanham, Angel Lozada, Cameron Loyal, Mariah Lyttle, Sarah Meahl, Christian Probst, Larkin Reilly, Julio Rey, Lily Rose, J. Savage, Tregoney Shepherd, Dave Schoonover, Paige Smallwood, Aléna Watters, Alyssa Carol, Gary Cooper, Robin Masella, Michael Milkanin, Chloe Nadon-Enriquez, and Lucas Thompson, begins previews at Broadway’s Imperial Theatre.
If You Love Me FREE staged reading, by Lyle Kessler, directed by Bobby Moresco, featuring Chazz Palminteri, Gabe Furman, Kathleen Simmonds, and Connor Chase Stewart, at 7 PM at Off-Broadway’s Actors Studio (also Feb.18). 
required here.
Saturday, February 18
Calvin Berger, by Barry Wyner, directed by Richard Israel, featuring Corinne Miller, Jordan Quisno, Frankie A. Rodriguez, and Jasmine Sharma, opens at Burbank’s Colony Theatre.
The Lifespan of a Fact, by Jeremy Kareken, David Murrell & Gordon Farrell, directed by Simon Levy, featuring Ron Bottitta, Inger Tudor, and Jonah Robinson, opens at LA’s Fountain Theatre.
Bedlam Theater‘s Fall River Fishing, by Zuzanna Szadkowski, directed by Eric Tucker, featuring Zuzanna Szadkowski, Susannah Millonzi, Tony Torn, and Jamie Smithson, begins previews at Off-Broadway’s Connelly Theater.
If You Love Me FREE staged reading, by Lyle Kessler, directed by Bobby Moresco, featuring Chazz Palminteri, Gabe Furman, Kathleen Simmonds, and Connor Chase Stewart, at 7 PM at Off-Broadway’s Actors Studio. : required here.
Christy Altomare in concert, at 8 PM at PA’s Bucks County Playhouse.
Sunday, February 19
Sunday in the Park with George, directed by Sarna Lapine, featuring Graham Phillips (George Seurat/George), Krystina Alabado (Dot/Marie), Michael Manuel (Jules/Bob), Emily Tyra (Yvonne/Naomi), Liz Larsen (Old Lady/Blair), Jenni Barber (Celeste #2/Elaine), Pippa Blaylock (Louise), Brian Calì (Boatman/Lee), Jennie Greenberry (Nurse), Trevor James (Soldier/Alex), Robert Knight (Louis/Charles), Deborah Lew(Frieda/Betty), Alexandra Melrose (Mrs./Harriet), Juliana Sloan (Celeste #1), Jimmy Smagula (Mr./Billy), and Jason Michael Snow (Franz/Dennis), with Marc Ginsburg, Armand Akbari, Allison Belinkoff, Savannah L. Jackson, Matthew McCoy, Brianna Pember, opens at Pasadena Playhouse.
The Group Rep‘s Harold and Maude, directed by Larry Eisenberg, featuring (rotating cast) Landon Beatty, Fox Carney, Lareen Faye, JC Gafford, Kat Kemmett, Jessica Kent, John Ledley, Lloyd Pederson, Susan Priver, Clara Rodriguez, Steve Shaw, Janet Wood, Gina Yates, and Douglas Gabrielle, opens at North Hollywood’s Lonny Chapman Theatre.
The Secret Garden, directed & choreographed by Warren Carlyle, featuring Sierra Boggess (Lily Craven), Terron Brooks (Major Shelley), Mark Capri (Ben Weatherstaff), Peyton Crim (Major Holmes), Derrick Davis (Archibald Craven), Susan Denaker (Mrs. Medlock), Kelley Dorney (Mrs. Winthrop/Cholera), Ali Ewoldt (Rose Lennox), William Foon(Colin Craven alternate), Ava Madison Gray (Mary Lennox alternate), John Krause (Captain Albert Lennox), Aaron Lazar (Dr. Neville Craven), Julia Lester (Martha), Reese Levine (colin Craven), John-Michael Lyles (Yamuna Meleth (Ayah), Cassandra Marie Murphy (Mrs. Shelley), James Olivas (Lieutenant Wright), Sadie Brickman Reynolds (Mary Lennox), Kyla Jordan Stone (Alice), and Vishal Vaidya (Fakir), with Randi De Marco, Sam Linkowski, and Ariel Neydavoud, begins previews at LA’s Ahmanson Theatre.
The Outsiders, world premiere by Adam Rapp, Jamestown Revival & Justin Levine, directed by Danya Taymor, featuring Brody Grant (Ponyboy), Sky Lakota-Lynch (Johnny), Daniel Marconi (Randy), Kevin William Paul (Bob), Brent Comer (Paul), Ryan Vasquez (Darrel), Da’Von T. Moody (Dallas), Jason Schmidt (Sodapop), Trevor McGhie (Two-Bit), Piper Patterson (Cherry), and Kiki Lemieux (Marcia), with Annelise Baker, Jordan Chin, Milena Comeau, Barton Cowperthwaite, Tilly Evans-Krueger, Spencer McCabe Hunsicker, Sean H. Jones, L’ogan J’ones, Renni Magee, Tristan McIntyre, Junior Nyong’o, Melody Rose, and Daryl Tofa, begins previews at La Jolla Playhouse.
Unbossed & Unbowed: The Shirley Chisholm Story presentation, written & performed by Ingrid Griffith, at 2 PM at Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theatre.
On the Twentieth Century 45th Anniversary Reunion Podcast, moderated by Charles Kirsch, featuring original cast members John Cullum (Oscar Jaffe) and George Lee Andrews (Max Jacobs), with Craig Lucas, and Mel Johnson Jr., at 8 PM ET for FREE on YouTube (and available as well after the podcast).
Between Riverside and Crazy, by Stephen Adly Guirgis, directed by Austin Pendleton, featuring Common (Junior), Stephen McKinley, Victor Almanzar, Elizabeth Canavan, Rosal Colón, and Michael Rispoli, closes at Broadway’s Haye’s Theatre.
Wuthering Heights, adapted & directed by Emma Rice, featuring Sam Archer (Lockwood/EdgarLinton/The Moors), Leah Brotherhead (Catherine), Georgia Bruce (Isabella Linton/Little Linton/The Moors), Lloyd Gorman (Mr. Earnshaw/The Moors), TJ Holmes (Dr. Kenneth/The Moors), Jordan Laviniere (Leader of the Yorkshire Moors), Tama Phethean (Hindley Earnshaw/Hareton Earnshaw/The Moors), Eleanor Sutton (Frances Earnshaw/Catherine Linton/The Moors), and Liam Tamne (Heathcliff), with Stephanie Elstob, closes at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre.
Secret Hour, world premiere by Jenny Stafford, directed by Margaret E. Hall, featuring Marina Shay (Professor Kate Gordon), Joshua David Robinson (Ben), and Whit K. Lee (Leaf), closes at Albany’s Capital Rep.
Ensemble Theatre Company‘s Selling Kabul, by Sylvia Khoury, directed by Nike Doukas, featuring Rishan Dhamija (Taroon), Nitya Vidyasagar (Afiya), Beejan Land (Jawid), and Christine Mirzayan (Leyla), closes at Santa Barbara’s New Vic.
Katrina, world premiere by La Darrion Williams, directed by Jazmine Nichelle, featuring Antwan Alexander II, Cassandra Carmona, John Goodwin, Zenarra James, and Jessica Perkins, closes at North Hollywood’s Loft Ensemble.
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Reviews for Roundabout’s The Wanderers at Off-Broadway’s Laura Pels Theatre:
NY Times (Jesse Green): …The Wanderers may be the first [play] to consider the problem of forced matches while also exemplifying it… a lot of plot for a 105-minute play, even before the lopsided interaction between the two stories, and the potential to explore generational harm through them, is overshadowed by an out-of-the-blue development… [Katie] Holmes…is still feeling her way around a world that lacks a camera… But her indistinctness is also the result of the problem of representing virtual communication onstage… The Wanderers feels, like its vague title, unmoored… It’s an irony that in trying to weld two such stories together, The Wanderers doesn’t enhance those elements but compromises them.
Theatermania (Hayley Levitt): …don’t let a seemingly inelegant title shake your faith in Ziegler. She isn’t conjuring a contrived image of Israelites trekking through the desert for 40 biblical years for nothing. And if you leave confident in the protection of a cosmic order, you haven’t been listening closely enough… The Wanderers asks more questions than it answers… Enter shiksa goddess Julia Cheever, played by Katie Holmes with the effortlessly enthralling presence that explains the irrationality of all parasocial relationships… a slight sense of flatness that this revolving door of paired scenes creates within a play whose ideas are bursting with three-dimensionality…
Vulture (Jackson McHenry): It’s hard to say too much about the premise of Anna Ziegler’s The Wanderers without spoiling the primary enjoyment you get from it, , which is learning how exactly Ziegler has entwined her characters, her plot unfolding like a kid’s paper fortune teller. The frustration in the Roundabout’s staging is that it doesn’t keep up with the script. The director, Barry Edelstein, takes a steady, dutiful approach to something that is trying to reach toward more abstract reckoning, and by the end, the staging starts to do it a disservice… You long for a staging that’s a bit more graceful and less literal, a way to delineate the story lines visually without so much foot traffic…
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David Byrne & Fatboy Slim’s Here Lies Love will begin previews June 17 and open July 20 at the Broadway Theatre, directed by Alex timbers, with choreography by Annie-B Parson.
Jose Llana, Conrad Ricamora, and more TBA.
The disco musical is about former Philippines First Lady Imelda Marcos’ rise and fall.
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Mandy Gonzalez & Javier Muñoz: Hitting New Heights will take place Sun. Mar. 5 at 2 PM at Costa Mesa’s Segerstrom Center.
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Rachel Sheinkin, Jay Reiss & William Finn’s The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee will run Mar. 14 – Apr. 9 at NJ’s George Street Playhouse, directed by Colin Hanlon, with music direction by Mat Eisenstein, and choreography by Nancy Renee Braun.
Ally Bonino (Rona Lisa Peretti), Jordan Matthew Brown (William Barfee), Lila Coogan (Olive Ostrovsky), Coleman Steele Cummings (Chip Tolentino), Angel Lin (Logainne Schwartzandgrubeniere), Sammy Pignalosa (Leaf Coneybear), Aaron Michael Ray (Mitch Mahoney), Kilty Reidy (Douglas Panch), and Sumi Yu (Marcy Park), with Izzy Figueroa and Gillian Hassert.
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Anna Deavere Smith’s Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 will run Mar. 8 – Apr. 9 (0pening Mar. 15) at the Mark Taper Forum, directed by Gregg T. Daniel.
Casting TBA.
Nearly 30 years after the Los Angeles uprising following the Rodney King verdict, the play returns home to the Taper to be re-imagined with an ensemble cast for a new generation of audiences. A stunning and seminal play that explores the devastating human impact of the five days of uprising following the Rodney King verdict. From 9 months of over 300 interviews conducted during the year following the uprising,
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Sandy Rustin’s The Cottage will run July 7 – Oct. 29 (opening July 24) at the Hayes Theatre (link TBA), directed by Jason Alexander. Additional information TBA.
Eric McCormack, Laura Bell Bundy, Lilli Cooper, and more TBA.
The play is set in the English countryside in 1923, this tale of sec, betrayal and love unfolds when Sylvia decides to expose her affair to both her husband and to her lover’s wife. The true meaning of fate, identity and marriage are called into question as a surprising and hilarious web of secrets unravels in this ridiculous – potentially murderous – romantic comedy.
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5-Star Theatricals will present Ragtime: The Musical Mar. 24 – Apr. 2 at CA’s Thousand Oaks’ Bank of America Performing Arts Center (formerly the Thousand Oaks Civics Arts Plaza), directed by Jeffrey Polk, with choreography by Michelle Elkin, and music direction by Tom Griffin.
Marty Austin Lamar (Coalhouse), Brittany Anderson (Sarah), Misty Cotton (Mother), Michael Scott Harris (Father), Hank Jacobs (Tateh), Samantha Wynn-Greenstone (Emma Goldman), Ceron Jones (Booker T), Monica Ricketts (Evelyn Nesbit), Jeremy Ingraham (Younger Brother), Steven Perren (Grandfather), Jacob Hoff (Harry Houdini), Josh Christoff (JP Morgan), Davis Hamilton (Henry Ford), Lila Dunham (Little Girl), Daxton Bethoney (Little boy), and Jordan Jackson (Sarah’s Friend), with Christopher D. Baker, Emily Cochrane, Domo D’DAnte, BK Dawson, Julia Feeley, Glen Hall, Tyler Marshall, Almand Martin, Jr., Donovan Mendelovitz, Kristen O’Connell, Will Riddle, Zara Saje, Leasa Shukiar, Kumari Small, Tania Pasano Storrs, Dekontee Tucrkile, Delilah Bank, Tanner Cox, Camryn Daniels, Madelyn Freidman, Harley Grey, Harrington Gwin, Madison North, Calulla Sawyer, Weston Walker-Pardee , Poppi Wilbur-McDaniels and Olivia Zenetzis.
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CA’s La Mirada Theatre (link TBA) has announced its 2023-24 season:
Creative teams and casting TBA.
On Your Feet (Oct. 6-29)
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (Nov. 10 – Dec. 3)
Mystic Pizza (Jan. 19 – Feb. 11, 2024)
Fiddler on the Roof (Apr. 19 – May 12)
The Little Mermaid (May 31 – June 23)
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Actors’ Equity Association may have a new name in headlines next year. The national union representing more than 51,000 actors and stage managers working on Broadway and professional stages nationwide announced to members Feb. 16 that the organization is working towards proposals to stakeholders to select a new name for the union, after which they will work on finalizing the name change and rebranding.
Towards the end of the process, which according to Equity’s statement is not expected to occur until 2024, the union will navigate a rebranding that may include a new logo, new tagline, and a new visual identity.
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& 
NYC’s 92Y will offer a performance & conversation with the Off-Broadway cast of Roundabout’s The Wanderer, by Anna Ziegler, on Thurs. Mar. 9 at 7:30 PM Off-Broadway’s Laura Pels Theatre, moderated by Ruthie Fierberg.
Sarah Cooper, Lucy Freyer, Katie Holmes, Dave Klasko, and Eddie Kaye Thomas.
The play tells the story of two Jewish couples grappling with big questions about the nature of happiness, spirituality, love, and the stories we tell about our lives. Cast members will discuss the play, how they prepared for their roles, stories from backstage, and more.
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Jon Hartmere’s Once Upon a One More Time, featuring the music of Britney Spears, will begin previews May 13 and open June 22 at the Marquis Theatre, directed by Keone & Mari Madrid.
Briga Heelan (Cinderella), Justin Guarini (Prince Charming), Aisha Jackson (Snow White), and more TBA.
The new musical flips the script on fairytale icon. Cinderella, Snow White, Little Mermaid, and other classic storybook characters, as they gather for their fortnightly book club, when a rogue fairy godmother grants their wish for a new story, but dropping “The Feminine Mystique” into their corseted laps.