Today’s Highlights:
Endgame, by Samuel Becket, directed by Ciarán O’Reilly, featuring Bill Irwin, John Douglas Thompson, Joseph Grifasi, and Patrice Johnson, opens at Off-Broadway’s Irish Rep.
Clint Holmes – Between The Moon and New York City: The Songs of Peter Allen concert opens at San Francisco’s Feinstein’s at the Nikko, with music direction by Michael Orland.
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), begins previews at Santa Barbara’s New Vic.
Eleri Ward: Acoustic Sondheim concert, at 7:30 PM at NYC’s City Winery.
We Start in Manhattan, a concert version of a new queer musical by Arielle Serur & Say Souza, featuring Shelby Acosta, Mehry Eslaminia, Kristolyn Lloyd, Sara Porkalob, Sushma Saha, Arielle Serur, Brooke Simpson, Sav Souza, and Imani Pearl Williams, at 7 PM atNYC’s 54 Below, directed by Ellie Heyman. Live tix here. Livestream tix here.
Michael Orland Open Mic Night concert, with special guest Debbie Gravitte, from 6-9 PM at Oscar’s Palm Springs.
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Ossie Davis’ Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch will begin performances in late summer 2023 (dates TBA) at a theater TBA, directed by Kenny Leon.
Leslie Odom, Jr., and more TBA.
A folkloric look at life in the Old South, with the title-character, a preacher, hoping to run an integrated church and facing a bigoted plantation owner.
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A Chorus Line will run Mar. 11 – Apr. 15 (opening Mar. 16) at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, directed by Blake Robison, with choreography by Alex Sanchez.
Shiloh Goodin (Cassie), Drew Lachey (Zach), Courtney Arango (Diana Morales), Diego Guevara (Paul), Rei Akazawa-Smith (Lois), Evan Autio (Larry), Maria Briggs (Maggie Winslow), Claire Camp (Judy), Erin Chupinsky (Sheila Bryant), Maurice Dawkins (Mike), Nicolas de la Vega (Butch), Jonathan Duvelson (Richie), Derek Ege (Mark), Joseph Fierberg (Gregory), Francesca Granell (Bebe), Diego Guevara (Paul), Musa Hitomi (Connie), Cameron Holzman (Don), Jalen Michael Jones (Frank), Jacob Major (Al), Zoë Maloney (Vicki), Matthew Marvin (Roy), Alexa Racioppi (Val), Matthew Ranaudo (Bobby), and Antonia Raye (Kristine), Sammy Schechter (Tom), with jenna Bienvenue, Haley Haskin, and Christopher Wells.
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An Evening with James Snyder will take place Thur. Apr. 27 at 8:30 PM at Hollywood’s Catalina Jazz Club, with surprise special guests.
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The St. Louis Muny has announced its 2023 Summer Season. Casting TBA.
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (June 12-18), directed by Marcia Milgrom Dodge, with choreography by Patricia Wilcox, and music direction by Charlie Alterman.
Beauty and the Beast (June 22-30), directed by John Tartaglia, with choreography by Patrick O’Neill, and music direction by Ben Whiteley.
Chess (July 5-11), directed by Josh Rhodes, with choreography by Lee Wilkins, and music direction by Jason DeBord.
West Side Story (July 15-21), directed by Rob Ruggiero, with choreography by Parker Esse, and music direction by James Moore.
Little Shop of Horrors (July 25-31), directed by Maggie Burrows, with choreography by William Carlos Angulo, and music direction by Andrew Graham.
Rent (Aug. 4-10), directed by Lili-Anne Brown, with choreography by Breon Arzell, and music direction by Jermaine Hill.
Sister Act (Aug. 14-20), directed & choreographed by Denis Jones, with music direction by Sheilah Walker.
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Tectonic Theater Project will present Moises Kaufman & Amanda Gronich’s Here There Are Blueberries May 7 – 28 at DC’s Shakespeare Theatre, directed by Kaufman.
Casting TBA.
The play is based on true events surrounding a mysterious album of never-before-seen Nazi-era photographs that arrived at the desk of Unites States Holocaust Memorial Museum archivist Rebecca Erbelding. As Rebecca and her team of historians begin to unravel the shocking story behind the images, the album soon makes headlines around the world. In Germany, a bussinessman see the album online, recognizes his own grandfather in the photos, and begins a journey of discovery that will lead him to a reckoning of his family’s past and his country’s history.
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A film adaptation of Bizet’s opera, “Carmen,” will be released Apr. 21, directed by Benjamin Millpied.
Paul Mescal, Melissa Barrera, and more.
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Eric Jordan Young & Wendy Dann’s solo show about Sammy Davis, Sammy & Me will run Aug. 14-20 at Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theater, directed by Dann.
Eric Nordan Young
Sammy Davis, Jr: singer, dancer, child star, fixture of the Rat Pack… but at what cost? Eric Jordan Young investigates his own obsession with Sammy — and his questions takes audiences on a whirlwind journey through Sammy”s life and his music. But when you ask: who was the man behind the cool smile? the answers that unravel are as powerful as the new questions they raise.
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The Festival of New American Musicals will present selections from new musicals on Mon. Mar. 13 at 7:30 PM at Hollywood’s Bourbon Room, hosted by Laura Schein & Clayton Farris. Performers TBA.
Madness, by Sam Johnides & Tony Gonzales. When your mind is freed from the walls you’ve allowed to rise around you, what you call freedom others call Madness.
Teaching A Robot To Love, by E. Aaron Wilson & Laser Webber. A sci-fi musical about the trans experience.
Gideon and the Blundersnorp: An Adventure Musical, by Michael Gordon Shapiro. A musical about being your best self and fighting a giant monster.
Tie Dye and Pearls, by Michael Harold. It’s 1969, and Danielle is living the counterculture life, or so Danielle thinks until she wins a scholarship to an elite all girl college. The old world meets the new world and generations collide.
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& Juliet star Justin David Sullivan is speaking out about The Tony Awards’ gendered performance categories in the wake of the awards’ Administration Committee releasing its first round of eligibility determinations earlier today. That committee meeting means the deadline has passed for productions to make requests about which categories performers should be considered for in terms of nominations. Given the choice of actor or actress categories, Sullivan, who is non-binary and playing a non-binary character, has bowed out completely.
“I was told that I had to choose [the category in which] I felt comfortable, and in that process, I struggled a lot,” Sullivan told Playbill. “There’s nothing more that I want to empower than non-binary people, to show that it’s possible to be non-binary on Broadway, play a non-binary character on Broadway and be nominated, and possibly potentially awarded. I felt like I couldn’t choose. I didn’t feel right being in either category because it didn’t resonate with me. I decided the only thing that felt right to me would be to abstain from nomination consideration. So I will not be considered for a Tony nomination.”
According to The New York Times, Sullivan is not the first non-binary performer to pull themselves out from Tony Award consideration. Asia Kate Dillon, Malcolm in last season’s Macbeth, did the same, though that decision was not made public.
In light of Sullivan’s abstention, the Tonys, co-presented by The Broadway League and The American Theatre Wing, has released a statement. “We recognize that the current acting categories are not fully inclusive, and we are currently in discussion about how to best adjust them to address this. Unfortunately, we are still in process on this and our rules do not allow us to make changes once a season has begun. We are working thoughtfully to ensure that no member of our community feel excluded [on the basis of gender identity] in future seasons.”
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Complete casting has been announced for David Thompson & Sharon Washington’s New York, New York, with additional songs by Kander & Ebb and Lin-Manuel Miranda, which will begin previews Mar. 24 and open Apr. 6 at the St. James Theatre, directed & choreographed by Susan Stroman, with music direction by Alvin Hough, Jr.
Clyde Alves (Tommy Caggiano), John Clay III (Jesse Webb), Janet Dacal (Sofia Diaz), Ben Davis (Gordon Kendrick), Colton Ryan (Jimmy Doyle), Anna Uzele (Francine Evans), Oliver Prose (Alex Mann), Angel Sigala (Mateo Diaz), and Emily Skinner (Madame Veltri), with Wendi Bergamini, Allison Blackwell, Giovanni Bonaventura, Jim Borstelmann, Lauren Carr, Mike Cefalo, Bryan J. Cortés, Kristine Covillo, Gabriella Enriquez, Haley Fish, Ashley Blair Fitzgerald, Richard Gatta, Stephen Hanna, Naomi Kakuk, Akina Kitazawa, Ian Liberto, Kevin Ligon, Leo Moctezuma, Aaron Nicholas Patterson, Dayna Marie Quincy, Julian Ramos, Drew Redington, Benjamin Rivera, Vanessa Sears, Davis Wayne, Jeff Williams, and Darius Wright.
Inspired by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Motion Picture “New York, New York”, the new musical is set in 1946. The war is over, and a collection of artists has dreams as big and diverse as the city itself.
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The 33rd annual Kleban Prize for Musical Theatre will be presented Mon. Feb. 6 at 5 PM in a private NYC ceremony (by invitation only), hosted by Richard Maltby.
Ryan Scott Oliver (most promising musical theatre lyricist)
Ethan Lipton (most promising musical theatre librettist)
Brian Stokes Mitchell, Alex Brightman, Lindsay Mendez, and more TBA.
The presentation will be available to stream on Broadway On Demand beginning Feb. 10 at 8 PM ET through Feb. 16 on the FREE ad-supported channel.
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Dave Malloy’s Preludes continues to Feb. 5 at Boston’s Lyric Stage, directed by Courtney O’Connor.
Aimee Dahl, Will McGarrahan, Anthony Pires Jr., Dan Prior, Kayla Shimizu, Allison Beaureguard, and Matthew Zahnzinger.