Today’s Highlights:
* Red Bull Theater‘s American Moor FREE benefit reading, by Keith Hamilton Cobb, starring Keith Hamilton Cobb and Josh Tyson, streams at 7:30 PM ET.
* Dancing for Democracy encore benefit performance, the Mondays for BIDEN benefit event, created to find a virtual place for busy artists, humanitarians, parents, and Joe Biden supporters, with special guests include Annaleigh Ashford, Laura Benanti, Chris Gatelli, Nikki M. James, Kathleen Marshall, Jerry Mitchell, Sergio TRujillo, Adrienne Barbeau, Danny Burstein, Marcia Milgrom Dodge, Robert La Fosse, Beth Malone, Rory O’Malley, Valarie Pettiford, Jessica Lee Goldyn, JoAnn M. Hunter, Jess LeProtto, Gerry McIntyre, Josh Walden, James Kinney, and more, streams at 9 PM ET here.
* Lucia di Lammermoor opera (2009), starring Anna Netrebko, Piotr Beczała, Mariusz Kwiecień, and Ildar Abdrazakov, conducted by Marco Armiliato, streams at NYC’s Metropolitan Opera.
* Jim Caruso’s Cast Party variety show streams at 8 PM ET here.
* LA’s Blank Theatre Living Room Series of new plays, streams at 8 PM PT (continues on Mondays through Dec. 7)
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GRACE NOTES Quiz Theatre-by-the-Numbers by Jim Bernhard
Fill in the missing words indicated by the initial letters in these titles of plays and musicals, all of which start with a number. As a hint, the names of the authors are in parentheses.
1. 1 T of V (Perelman, Nash, Weill)
2. 6 C in S of an A (Pirandello)
3. 12 A M (Rose)
4. 27 W F of C (Williams)
5. 40 C (Allen, Grédy, Barillet)
6. 45 M to B (Cohan)
7. 84 C C R (Hanff, Roose-Evans)
8. 110 in the S (Nash, Schmidt, Jones)
9. 1,000 C (Gardner)
10. 50,000,000 F (Fields, Porter)
Scroll down for the answers…
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The world premiere of Lynn Nottage’s MJ, the Michael Jackson musical, will now begin previews in Sept. 2021 (exact date TBA) at the Neil Simon Theatre, directed & choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon, with music direction by Jason Michael Webb.
Ephraim Sykes (Michael Jackson), and more TBA.
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Video: “Stars in the House,” with a reading of Tina Howe’s Coastal Disturbances, directed by Annette Bening, featuring Bening, Jonas Abry, Timothy Daly, Jean De Baer, Angela Goethals, Ronald Guttman, Heather Mac Rae, Mary Kay Place and Ed Begley Jr. (1:58:02)
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Jewelle Blackman, Yvette Gonzalez-Nacer & Kay Trinidad (known as The Fates from Hadestown), will released “If The Fates Allow: A Hadestown Holiday Album” digitally and on CD on Nov. 20. 
Pre-order here.
The entire cast will also appear on the album as well.
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“Grammy Salute to Music Legends” will air Fri. Oct. 16 at 9 PM ET on PBS.
Rhiannon Giddens, Joe Mantegna, John Legend, LL COOL J, Greg Phillinganes, Henry Rollins, and Don Was.
Leslie Odom, Jr., Cynthia Erivo, Laurie Anderson, Philip Bailey, Brandi Carlile, Chris Isaak, Jason Isbell, Amanda Shires, Cyndi Lauper, Sam Moore, and Yola.
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Video: The London casts of Les Miz, Mary Poppins, and The Phantom of the Opera perform live on “Britain’s Got Talent 2020,” featuring Michael Ball, Matt Lucas, Carrie Hope Fletcher, John Owen-Jones, Shan Ako, Killian Donnelly, Zizi Strallen and Charlie Stemp.
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Cambridge’s A.R.T. has announced its Fall 2020 Virtual Season (all dates TBA):
* Virtually OBERON new work series, featuring new performances filmed at Oberon, shows from the Oberon archives, a world premiere play.
* Jack and the Beanstalk: A Musical Adventure (begins Nov. 27), world premiere by Julia Riew, directed by Rebecca Aparicio, with music direction by Ian Chan
* “The Lunch Room” (Tuesdays at 12 PM ET),a weekly talk show.
* 1776 Salon Series (Oct. 5 & 21), offering conversations, lectures, and performance events on history, politics, justice, and the meaning of democracy.
…and much more…
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Video: John McDaniel performs his new song, “You Gotta Vote”
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“Alice,” a new musical film based on “Alice in Wonderland,” will premiere on Netflix (date TBA), written by Ross Evans.
Sabrina Carpenter (Alice), and more TBA.
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The album from Netflix’s “Over the Moon” will be released Oct. 23, with songs by Christopher Curtis, Marjorie Duffield, and Helen Park. The film will also debut Oct. 23.
(voice actors in the series): Phillipa Soo, Ruthie Ann Miles, Ken Jeong, Cathy Ang, Robert G. Chiu, and Steven Price.
Video: “Ultraluminary,” performed by Phillipa Soo.
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Arizona Theatre Company will present Brian Lowdermilk, Kate Kerrigan, Samantha Brown & Lauren Gunderson’s Justice Mar. 13 – Apr. 3, 2021.
Casting TBA.
It’s 1993 and Ruth Bader Ginsburg has just joined as the second woman on the United States Supreme Court. The first woman, Sandra Day O’Connor, is there to greet her. In an intimate 3-person musical built of urgent and honest conversations, sweeping songs, and gripping monologues, we come to know these two iconic woman at the height of their power.
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North Hollywood’s Road Theatre Company presents “Under Construction,” a platform to create and workshop new plays, where plays are developed from the bottom up with 11 playwrights.
Fri. Oct. 23 & 24 at 6 & 9 PM PT
* The Keepsake, by Carlos Lacámara, directed by Meeghan Holaway, featuring Tom Knickerbocker, Ann Hearn, and Kacie Rogers. Love and clocks.
* The Statement, by Bernardo Cubría, directed by Chelsea Gonzalez, featuring Roland Ruiz, Chelsea Gonzalez, Jon Sprik, and Kyle Bryan Hall. Late to put out a “Black Lives Matter statement, the marketing team at White Claw holds an emergency meeting to find the right words while remaining on brand.
* Bubble, by Jennifer Maisel, directed by Sara Guerrero, featuring Cherish Monique Duke and Presciliana Esparolini. Two women hover on the brink, juggling the insanity of solo parenting in the pandemic. How far with they go their friendship?
* Snowflake, by Velina Hasu Houston, directed by Stewart J. Zully, featuring Kimberly Green, Jennifer Finch, and Dana Lee. Two college administrators of color meet online with an applicant they think is Black. Much to their surprise, while the applicant identifies as Black, she looks White. The encounter blows to smithereens all notions of race and ethnic diversity.
Sat. Oct. 24 at 6 & 9 PM PT:
* ExZOOMED, written & directed by Steve Apostolina, featuring Jonathan Nichols, Meeghan Holaway, Stephen Tobolowsky, and Ann Hearn. 23 years after their mysterious breakup, two ex-lovers reunite on Zoom. Inner secrets will finally be exhumed — and truth is king.
* Terrorist is spelled K-A-R-E-N, by Anja Houston, directed by Inger Tudor, featuring Christian Telesmar, Kacie Rogers, and Paris Perrault. Grocery stores. Parks. Sidewalks. Restaurants, At home. Black couple, Toni and X, fight daily for their survival as they move through these commonplace spaces that are regularly targeted by the American terrorist group, KAREM. When one member violently attacks X, Toni struggles to help put the pieces of his soul back together KAREN sought to annhlilate.
* Reach, by Jenny Webb, directed by Susan Diol, featuring Brian M. Cole, Judith Moreland, and Carlyle King. A short comedy about the ways in which we connect, or try to. The play takes a peek at socially-distanced friends during a time when the dual pandemics of Covid-19 and Racism hit Los Angeles — and bring them together — in rather revealing ways.
* Everything Is Going To Be Okay, by Jami Brandli, directed by Ann Hearn, featuring Lizzy Kimball, Brian Graves, and Donna Simone Johnson.
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Video: Marin Mazzie sings “Not A Day Goes By” (2015)
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“Ayad Akhtar: Homeland Elegies” — a conversation with Oskar Eustis, will take place Thurs. Oct. 15 at 7 PM ET here.
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Video: First trailer for the film version of London’s “Everybody Loves Jamie,” which will open Feb. 26, 2021 in the U.S.
Max Harwood (Jamie New) Richard E. Grant (Hugo), Sharon Horgan (Miss Hedge), and Sarah Lancashire (Margaret New), Lauren Patel, Shobna Gulati, Ralph Ineson, Adeel Akhtar, and Samuel Bottomley.
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“If The Fates Allow: A Hadestown Holiday Album” will released on Nov. 20. 
here.
Jewelle Blackman, Yvette Gonzalez-Nacer, and Kay Trinidad.
The 14-track album will include beloved holiday classic, songs composed by Gonzalez-Nacer, Anaïs Mitchell, and Liam Robinson, as gems waiting to be discovered, all steeped in blues, folk, ragtime, and jazz.
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Video: “A Moment for Broadway,” directed by Tom Kitt, performing “Sunday” (from Sunday in the Park with George) featuring Broadway Inspirational Voices, Kate Baldwin, Sierra Boggess, Charl Brown, Andréa Burns, Carolee Carmello, Danielle Chambers, Casey Clark, Kris Coleman, Gavin Creel, Jennifer Damiano, Allyson Kaye Daniel, Brandon Victor Dixon, Eden Espinosa, Lucia Giannetta, Jason Gotay, Erika Henningsen, Marcus Paul James, Telly Leung, Norm Lewis, Zonya Love, Anastacia McCleskey, Javier Muñoz, Jon Eric Parker, Bernadette Peters, Andrew Rannells, Kris Roberts, Desiree Rodriguez, Eliseo Roman, Ben Roseberry, Stark Sands, Ari’el Stachel, and Virginia Woodruff.
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The sheet music for Broadway’s Jagged Little Pill is now available here.
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Many thanks to Eric Roth for sharing this:
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GRACE NOTES Quiz answers: Theatre-by-the-Numbers
1. One Touch of Venus(by S. J. Perelman, Ogden Nash, Kurt Weill)
2. Six Characters in Search of an Author(by Luigi Pirandello)
3. Twelve Angry Men(by Reginald Rose)
4. Twenty-Seven Wagons Full of Cotton(by Tennessee Williams)
5. Forty Carats(by Jay Presson Allen, Jean-Pierre Grédy, and Pierre Barrillet)
6. Forty-Five Minutes to Broadway(by George M. Cohan)
7. 84 Charing Cross Road (by Helene Hanff and James Roose-Evans)
8. 110 in the Shade(by N. Richard Nash, Harvey Schmidt, and Tom Jones)
9. A Thousand Clowns(by Herb Gardner)
10. Fifty Million Frenchmen(by Herbert Fields and Cole Porter)