Today’s Highlights:
The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window, by Lorraine Hansberry, directed by Anne Kauffman, featuring Oscar Isaac (Sidney Brustein), Rachel Brosnahan (Iris Brustein), Gus Birney (Gloria Parodus), Julian De Niro (Alton Scales), Glenn Fitzgerald (David Ragin), Andy Grotelueschen (Wally O’Hara), Miriam Silverman (Mavis Parodus Bryson), and Raphael Nash Thompson (Max), with Joey Auzenne, Katya Campbell, Gregory Connors, and Brontë England Nelson, opens at Broadway’s James Earl Jones Theatre.
God of Carnage, by Yasmina Reza, directed by Nicholas Viselli, featuring Christiane Noll, David Burtka, Carey Cox, and Gabe Fazio, opens at Off-Broadway’s Theatre Row.
Red Bull Theater & Fiasco Theater’s The Knight of the Burning Pestle, by Francis Beaumont, directed by Noah Brody & Emily Young, featuring Jessie Austrian, Royer Bockus, Tina Chilip, Paul L. Coffey, Devin E. Haqq, Teresa Avia Lim, Darius Pierce, Ben Steinfeld, Paco Tolson, and Tatiana Wechsler, opens at Off-Broadway’s Lucille Lortel Theatre.
J2 Spotlight Musical Theatre Company‘s Sugar, directed by Robert W. Schneider, featuring Chris Cherin, (Joe/Josephine), Andrew Leggiere (Jerry Daphne), Alexandra Amadeo Frost (Sugar Kane), Lexi Rhoades (Sweet Sue), Richard Rowan (Osgood Fielding III), and Orden Korenblum (Spats Palazzo), with Conor Coughlin, Caleb James Grochalski, Bobby MacDonell, Jordan Ari Bross, and Molly Samson, opens at Off-Broadway’s Theatre Row.
Creditors, by August Strindberg, newly translated & directed by Robert Greer, featuring Natalie Menna (Tekla), Brad Fryman (Adolf), and Mike Roche (Gustav), opens at Off-Broadway’s Theatre for the New City.
Karen Mason’s Back…And All That Jazz concert, directed by Barry Kleinbort, opens at Chicago’s Davenport’s Piano Bar & Cabaret.
James Snyder in Concert, with music direction by Michael Orland, and special guests Lesli Margherita, Audra Lee, and Sophie Pollono, at 8:30 PM at Hollywood’s Catalina Jazz Club.
Michael R. Jackson in Concert closes at Lincoln Center’s Claire Tow Theater.
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Reviews for New York, New York at Broadway’s St. James Theatre:
NY Times (Elisabeth Vincentelli): There’s a big new Broadway musical called New York, New York, and it’s based on the Martin Scorsese film bearing the same title. Sort of… And it is that title song alone, rather than the movie, that is the true inspiration for the sprawling, unwieldy, surprisingly dull show… sadly, none make much of an impression, mired as they are in a syrupy muck of good sentiments and grating civic cheerleading… As the various story lines move toward their inevitable intersection, any sign of wrinkle or kink has been smoothed out. The most prominent victims are the reimagined Jimmy and Francine, who have been flattened into cardboard figures… a central void that further restrains the overly polished book — friction feeds fiction… If only New York, New York had interpreted that line [“You can be anyone here, do anything here”] not as a reassurance, but as a challenge to dare.
Los Angeles Times (Charles McNulty) …the latest tourist shop to set up business in the theater district… meant to be a love letter to the city that never sleeps. Could that be why the musical is so exhausting?… The song [“New York, New York”] — which is teased at various points in the show — is given quite the liftoff at the end… Susan Stroman…pulls out all the stops in a finale that has the band rising from the pit on what looks like a giant Santa Claus sled. The audience drools on Pavlovian reflex. But it’s an orgasm that takes so long to achieve that many theatergoers will be sleepwalking through it… The show is so awash in music that I felt as if I were bobbing in a sea of redundant Broadway refrains… But it’s not fair to pin the blame on Stroman, who is merely trying to cover up the emptiness at the heart of the musical…
Daily News (Chris Jones): At the heart of New York, New York,… is an unanswered question. Does this show want to be a kind of East Coast “La La Land,” a romantic and tourist-friendly ode to the aesthetic charms and transformational powers of the greatest city in the world, or… something more attuned with the racially charged problems of modern-day America?I suspect their answer would be that they were trying to do both… A case in point here: New York, New York… is very much about the city’s demonstrably racist past. And yet, in certainly other moments, everyone in the show also seems to live in exactly the same neighborhoods, hanging together from neighboring tiny balconies in the late 1940s… So what are we talking here, fantasy or reality? It’s hard to tell…
Variety (Naveen Kumar): …Aside from the occasional f-bomb and pantomimed scurry of rats, the show that opened at Broadway’s St. James Theatre is a love letter to Manhattan so unabashed that its vibe might be best expressed in cityscape and heart-eye emojis. Cynical? These New Yorkers? Fuhgeddaboudit!… more accurately described as a musical-length rhapsody on the dreams crooned out in its title song, made famous by Frank Sinatra and naturally performed here as a big-band finale turned audience singalong… it’s all rendered with spectacular stagecraft… But the production’s zealous faith in New York — in its mythology of endless possibility and renewal — is near impossible to resist… Clichés, like stale bodega coffee, exist for a reason. They keep the city going even after it’s crashed and burned.
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Hamilton has announced new principle casting at the Victoria Palace Theatre, who will begin their runs on June 19.
Declan Spane (Alexander Hamilton), Ava Brennan (Angelica Schuyler), Simbi Akande (Peggy Schuyler/Maria Reynolds), Dom Hartley-Harris (George Washington), and Lemuel Knights (Marquis De Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson), with Gabriela Acosta, Elizabeth Armstrong, Alishia-Marie Blake, Aimie Hibbert, Sam Holden, Christian Knight, Nathan Louis-Fernand, Stacey McGuire, Lewis Newton, Hassun Sharif, Alex Tranter, and Maddison Tyson. Continuing their runs are Simon-Anthony Rhoden (Aaron Burr,) Shan Ako (Eliza Hamilton), Emile Ruddock (Hercules Mulligan/James Madison), Jake Halsey-Jones (John Laurens/Philip Hamilton), and Joel Montague (King George III), with Matthew Elliot-Campbell, Manaia Glassey-Ohlson, Maya Britto, Barney Hudson, Nicolais-Andre Kerry, Ella Kora, Aaron Lee Lambert, Kerri Norville, Samuel Sarpong-Broni, Lindsey Tierney, and Brandon Williams.
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Gypsy, which opens Apr. 28, has been extended through June 25 at CT’s Goodspeed, directed by Jenn Thompson.
Judy McLane (Rose), Talia Suskauer (Louise), Philip Hernandez (Herbie), Laura Sky Herman (Dainty June), Emily Jewel Hoder (Baby June), Cameron Blake Miller (Baby Louise), with Gabriel Amato, Romelda Teron Benjamin, Kelly Margaret Berman, Amahri Edwards-Jones, Carlos Velasquez Escammilla, Thomas Goldbach V, Sunny Lauren Hoder, Victoria Huston-Elem, Edward Juvier, Meadow Nguy, Bianca Belle Palana, Maddie Robert, Ben Sears, Michael Starr, Geoffrey Wade, David Cochise Williams, and Valerie Wright.
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Off-Broadway’s Red Bull Theater has announced its Running of the Red Bulls Gala Benefit, to take place Mon. June 5 at 6 PM at the Bowery Hotel, hosted by Patrick Page,
Julie Taymor
Arnie Burton, Kelley Curran, Tovah Feldshuh, Adam Green, Chukwudi Iwuji, Harry Lennix, Mark Linn-Baker, Teresa Avia Lim, Dakin Matthews, Luis Quintero, Matthew Rauch, Cara Ricketts, Laila Robins, Miriam Silverman, and more TBA.
Robert Cuccioli, Reeve Carney, Jacob Ming Trent, Jennifer Sánchez, Derek Smith, Mary Testa, Marc Vietor, and more TBA.
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Complete casting has been announced for The Doctor, written & directed by Robert Icke, to run June 3 – Aug. 19 at the Park Avenue Armory.
Juliet Stevenson, Christopher Osikanlu Colquhoun, Maria Louca, Daniel Rabin, Naomi Wirthner, and Hanna Ledwidge, Doña Croll, Juliet Garricks, Preeya Kalidas, John MacKay, and Jaime Schwarz.
The story of a young woman who is dying of sepsis, with her doctor refusing to allow a priest into the room.
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Cambridge’s A.R.T. has announced its 2023-24 season:
The Half-God of Rainfall (Sept. 8-24), by Inua Ellams, directed by Taibi Magar. When Demi—half Greek god, half Nigerian mortal—takes his first shot on a basketball court, the deities of the land wake up. But as Demi’s skills propel him from his village in South West Nigeria to the NBA playoffs and the London Olympics, Zeus gets jealous of his game.
Real Women Have Real Curves (Dec. 8 – Jan. 14, 2024), world premiere by Lisa Loomer, Joy Huerta & Benjamin Velez, directed by Sergio Truillo. It’s the summer of 1987 in Los Angeles’ Boyle Heights, and Ana wants to blaze her own path. The first-generation child of Mexican immigrants, Ana is torn between a future at her family’s garment business and her dreams of college in New York. If she breaks from her parents’ vision for her life, can she still honor the sacrifices that have allowed her to dream?
Becoming a Man (Feb. 16 – Mar. 10), world premiere by P. Carl, directed by Carl & Diane Paulus. When we change, can the people we love come with us? For fifty years, P. Carl lived as a girl and then a queer woman, building a career and a loving marriage while waiting to realize himself in full. When he decides to affirm his gender at a pivotal political moment in America, his transition puts everything—family, career, friendships—at stake.
Gatsby (dates TBA), world premiere, by Florence Welch, Thomas Bartlett & Martyna Majok, directed by Rachel Chavkin, with choreography by Sonya Tayeh. Bases on the novel.
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Direct from Broadway, Charles Fuller’s A Soldier’s Play will run May 23 – June 25 (opening May 24) at the Ahmanson Theatre, directed by Kenny Leon.
Norm Lewis (Captain Richard Davenport), Eugene Lee (Sergeant Vernon C. Waters), Will Adams (Corporal Bernard Cobb), Sheldon D. Brown (Private C.J. Memphis), Malik Esoj Childs (Private Tony Smalls), William Connell (Captain Charles Taylor), Alex Michael Givens (Corporal Ellis), Matthew Goodrich (Captain Wilcox), Chattan Mayes Johnson (Lieutenant Byrd), Branden Davon Lindsay (Private Louis Henson), Tarik Lowe (Private First-Class Melvin Peterson), and Howard W. Overshown (Private James Wilkie), with Brandon Alvión, Ja’Quán Cole, Charles Evertt, Al’Jaleel McGhee, and Alex Ross.
In 1944, on a Louisiana Army base, two shots ring out. A Black sergeant is murdered and a series of interrogations triggers a gripping barrage of questions about sacrifice, service, and identity in America.
Video: Promo
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Complete casting has been announced for Candice Jones’ Flex, to begin previews June 23 and open July 20 at Lincoln Center’s Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz.
Brittany Bellizeare, Christiana Clark, Renita Lewis, Erica Matthews, Ciara Monique, and Tomalili.
The story of a girls’ high school basketball team from Plainnole, Arkansas. It’s 1997, and the women of the Lady Train team are inspired by the successes of the WNBA. With aspirations of going pro, they must first navigate the pressures of being young, Black, and female in rural Arkansas. Will their fouls off the court tear their team apart? Or can they keep their pact to stick together through hell or high water?
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Video: First look at the “Wicked” film.
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Hollywood’s Catalina Jazz Club has announced its concerts featuring Broadway Leading Men – Hollywood:
An Evening with James Snyder (Apr. 27 at 8:30 PM). 
here.
Aaron Lazar: The Greatest Voices (June 1 at 8:30 PM). here.
Norm Lewis: Moonlighting (June 12 at 8:30 PM). here.