Today’s Highlights:
Almost Famous, by Tom Kitt, directed by Jeremy Herrin, featuring Chris Wook, Anika Larsen, Solea Pfeiffer, Drew Gehling, Rob Colletti, and Casey Likes, with Matt Bittner, Chad Burris, Gerard Canonico, Julia Cassandra, Brandon Contreras, Jakeim Hart, Van Hughes, Jana Djenne Jackson, Katie Ladner, Danny Lindgren, Erica Mansfield, Alisa Melendez, Emily Schultheis, Daniel Sovich, Libby Winters, and Matthew C. Yee, opens at Broadway’s Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre.
All Things Equal: The Life and Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, by Rupert Holmes, directed by Laley Lippard, featuring Michelle Azar, opens at Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theatre.
Porchlight Music Theatre‘s Rent, directed by Adrian Abel Azevedo, featuring Lucy Godinez (Maureen Johnson), Teressa LaGamba (Joanne Jefferson), Eric Lewis (Tom Collins), David Moreland (Mark Cohen), Alix Rhode (Mimi Marquez), Abraham Shaw (Benjamin “Benny” Coffin III), Josh Pablo Szabo (Antel Dumott Schunard), and Shraga D. Wasserman (Roger Davis), with Bridget Adams-King, Anthony Clerg, Naphtali Curry, Leah Davis, Caitlin Dobbins, Nick Johnson, Chris Khoshaba, and Nik Kmiecik, opens at Chicago’s Ruth Page Center for the Arts.
44 – The unOFFICIAL, unSANCTIONED OBAMA MUSICAL, by Eli Bauman, Monica Saunders Weinberg & Anthony “Brew” Brewster, directed by Bauman, featuring TJ Wilkins (Barak Obama), Shanice (Michelle Obama), Kevin Bailey (John Boehner), Ted Barton (Roger Ailes), Larry Cedar (Mitch McConnell), Chad Doreck (Joe Biden), Kelley Dorney (Hillary Clinton), Kitten Kuroi (Voice of the People), Jane Papageorge (Sarah Palin), Dino Shorté (Herman Cain), Jeff Sumner (Lindsay Graham), and Michael Uribes (Ted Cruz), opens at LA’s Bourbon Room.
Sandra, by David Cale, directed by Leigh Silverman, featuring Marjan Neshat, begins previews at Off-Broadway’s Vineyard Theatre.
Seth Rudetsky in concert, with special guest Lillias White, at 7 PM at Beverly Hills’ The Wallis.
My Body, No Choice, a FREE evening of monologues, by Lee Cataluna, Fatima Dyfan, Lisa Loomer, and Dael Orlandersmith, directed by Judith Morland, featuring Liza Fernandez, Tamika Katon-Donegal, Jenny O’Hara, Arianna Ortiz, Veralyn Jones, Amy Pietz, Pam Trotter, and Jenapher Zheng, concludes at LA’s Fountain Theatre.
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Reviews for Encore’s Parade at NY City Center:
NY Times (Juan A. Ramírez): …Smartly directed by Michael Arden…delves further into America’s history of violence and delivers the best-sung musical in many a New York season… The book writer Alfred Uhry’s dramatization of the 1913 trial of Leo Frank, and his subsequent imprisonment and 1915 lynching, gave the composer Jason Robert Brown a canvas to paint a complex, nourishing score that captures the entire weight of that fraught history… At the heart of the show is the rich-voiced Ben Platt… His sense of regional superiority is matched by the naïve comfort of his wife, Lucille (a luminous Micaela Diamond)… But the problems with the book, which lacks some dramatic immediacy, remain…
Theatermania (David Gordon): …Michael Arden’s entirely thrilling but physically frustrating revival… its leading man [Ben Platt] is the audience draw… Sean Allan Krill is extremely effective as the Governor… Manoel Felciano is downright terrifying as extremist rightwing journalist Tom Watson… Erin Mackey and…Gaten Matarazzo are stirring as Mary’s mother and boyfriend, respectively… Jennifer Laura Thompson, Howard McGillin, Jay Armstrong Johnson, John Dossett, and Douglas Lyons do very well in less pivotal roles. And Alex Joseph Grayson scores one of the night’s most rousing ovations for “That’s What He Said,” the fake testimony that gets Leo convicted.
AM New York (Matt Windman): …a deeply moving, critical-minded, extraordinary piece…. Arden’s heavy-handed, documentary-style (relying on historical photos and captions) direction is questionable, particularly the decision to stage most of the scenes on a small raised platform… Nevertheless, on the strengths of the casting, score, and storytelling, this makes for a gripping and thrilling production… Brown himself conducts the large orchestra – and there is no question that the score is far more sweeping and powerful when heard with its complete orchestrations… Platt (who remains onstage, and in character, throughout intermission) exhibits many of the same qualities of his Evan Hansen – soft-spoken, tense, scared – and it works.
Video: Ben Platt sings “This Is Not Over Yet”
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Reviews for Keen Company’s site-specific The Year of Magical Thinking:
NY Times (Laura Collins-Hughes): … [in the 2005 production], the sturdy, statuesque Redgrave – as the stand-in for a highly recognizable other, the diminutive Didion, who was in her early 70s then, with a fragility about her. It was all too large. It did not capture the essence of the book… How thrilling, then, that the first New York revival of The Year of Magical Thinking does. Directed by Jonathan Silverstein, this Keen Company production goes small, and in doing so, gets the play sublimely right… Its star is the esteemed Off Broadway actor Kathleen Chalfant, in what may be her best-matched role since Vivian Bearing in Wit, more than 20 years ago.
Theatermania (Pete Hempstead): …Kathleen Chalfant’s nuanced performance … Keen Company has now creatively revived and staged the work in venues much more intimate than the Booth Theatre… Presenting the play this way, director Jonathan Silverstein lends familiarity and depth to a monologue that can at times feel austere… a powerful play about the grieving process, but I couldn’t help feeling something was missing. We never hear Didion mention that she cried or lost control of her emotions; her grief seems too structured for that… But Chalfant injects unexpected emotion into other scenes….
Theatrely (Amanda Marie Miller): There is an unsettling quiet here… Sitting in a private living room on the Upper East Side, there are 14 people still with nervous tension and Kathleen Chalfant can see right through me… the words of writer Joan Didion are on display in their truest form… this dialogue is conversational… it is incredibly heavy, the themes rooted in the inevitability of death and grieving. All the while, on top of the colloquialisms and dark moments, our new home is luxurious and glittering… I wondered if her writing would still hold as strong as it once did, only to find it more relevant than ever… Kathleen Chalfant is absolutely remarkable in her nuance, stamina, and ability to create an entire world while sitting in an armchair. She is at home in this text.
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Complete casting has been announced for Roundabout‘s national tour of Charles Fuller’s A Soldier’s Play, directed by Kenny Leon, which launches Dec. 8 at New Haven’s Shubert Theatre. Click here for the complete tour schedule.
Eugene Lee (Sergeant Vernon C. Waters), Will Adams (Corporal Bernard Cobb, Sheldon D. Brown (Private C.J. Memphis), Malik 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 Overshown (Private James Wilkie), with Brandon Alvión, Ja’Quan Cole, Charles Everett, Al’Jaleel McGhee.
Set in 1944 on a U.S. Army base in the south, the play follows a black officer’s race against his white leadership to unravel the crime of a black sergeant’s murder.
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Chicago’s Goodman Theatre will present its 2022 New Stages Festival Dec. 1-18. 
All tickets are free and require a reservation.
This Happened Once at the Romance Depot off the I-87 in Westchester, by Gina Femia, directed by Kimberly Senior.
Rust, by Nancy García Loza, directed by Laura Alcalá Baker.
White Monkey, by Charlie Oh, directed by Eric Ting.
Fever Dreams (of Animals on the Verge of Extinction), by Jeffrey Lieber, directed by Susan V. Booth.
Modern Women, by Omer Abbas Salem, directed by Lavina Jadhwani.
What Will Happen to All That Beauty, by Donja R. Love, directed by Malika Ovetimein.
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Barry Wyner’s Calvin Berger will begin previews Feb. 16 and open Feb. 18, 2023 at Burbank’s Colony Theatre, directed by Richard Israel, with music direction by Anthony Lucca.
Casting TBA.
Loosely based on the story of Cyrano de Bergerac, the musical is the hilarious story of unrequited feelings, love notes, and physical insecurity among high school seniors.
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The world premiere of Ken Davenport & AnnMarie Milazzo’s Joy the Musical will run Dec. 7-30 at New Brunswick’s George Street Playhouse, directed by Casey Hushion, with choreography by Joshua Bergasse, and music supervision by Andy Einhorn.
Erika Henningsen (Joy), Vicki Lewis (Toots), Stephen De Rosa (Rudy), Trent Saunders (Tony), Sami Bray (Christie), Badia Farha (Ronnie), Pomme Koch (Dan), Hazel Anne Raymundo (Thelma), Oliva Jones (Young Joy), Hazel, and John Hickok (Cowboy Eddie), with Gaelen Gilliand, Ashleigh Marie Arnold, Brian Shepard, Dana Costello, Kristen Faith Oei, Alanna Saunders, Ryan Duncan, Anthony Wayne, Justin Gregory Lopez, Bronwyn Tarboton, and Michael Kolaczkowski.
The musical is based on the life of Joy Mangano – the entrepreneur, inventor, best-selling author, and self-made millionaire whose journey epitomizes the reas American Dream. The story of one woman’s triumphant climb from divorce to single motherhood and bankruptcy, to becoming a wildly successful dynamor that all started with the invention of a mop – her Miracle Mop!
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The Yorkville Nutcracker will run Dec. 9-11 at NYC’s Hunter College Kaye Playhouse, choreographed by Francis Patrelle.
New York City Ballet’s Miriam Miller and Jared Angle, and more TBA.
A magical tour of 1895 New York City with Dances Patrelle. Your journey begins with a Christmas Eve party at Gracie Mansion attended by dignitaries from around the world – including our new police commissioner, Theodore Roosevelt. Thrill as you behold a battle with life-sized mice! Then go for a bracing midnight skate on the ponds of Cental Park. Finally, take a sleigh-ride to the Grand Conservatory of the Bronx Botanical Gardens in time for a beautiful sunrise buffet of sweets, hosted by the Sugar-Plum Fairy.
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“The Penguin,” a spinoff series from “Batman” will be released on HBO Max (date TBA).
Colin Farrell (The Penguin), Cristin Milioti (Sofia Falcone) and more TBA.
The series follows The Penguin’s rise to power in the wake of Carmine Falcone’s death. Falcone ran the entire city, he had everyone in his pocket, and nobody acted without his permission. Now that he is dead, his empire is up for grabs, and Penguin intends to lay claim to it.
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The national tour of Ain’t Too Proud – The Life and Times of The Temptations will run Dec. 13 – Jan. 1, 2023 (opening Dec. 15) at the Ahmanson Theatre, directed by Des McAnuff, with choreography by Sergio Trujillo.
Jalen Harris (Eddie Kendricks), Harrell Holmes Jr. (Melvin Franklin), James T. Lane (Paul Williams), Marcus Paul James (Otis Williams), and Elijah Ahmad Lewis (David Ruffin), with Michael Andreaus, Gregory Carl Banks Jr., Brian C. Binion, Reed Campbell, Lawrence Dandridge, Shayla Brielle G., Treston J. Henderson, Najah Hetsberger, Devin Holloway, Antwaun Holley, Kyshawn Lane, Traci Elaine Lee, Brett Michal Lockley, Harris Matthew, Amber Mariah Talley, Andrew Volzer, and Nazarria Workman.
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A digital cast album of Broadway’s A Beautiful Noise will be released Dec. 4 on all platforms.
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Video: “I Was Too Late” music video from Manhattan Theatre Club’s Where the Mountain Meets the Sea.
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A talkback with playwright Rupert Holmes will take place Fri. Nov. 4 following the 8 PM performance of his new play, All Things Equal: The Life & Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsberg at Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theatre ,directed by Laley Lippard and starring Michelle Azar. The event is open to all ticket holders.
The play brings audiences into an intimate evening with Ruth Bader Ginsburg where over the course of 90 fascinating and often funny minutes, a sense of her life and its many trials is played out onstage.
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Patrick Page (Hades) will pay his final performance in Hadestown on Dec. 30 at Broadway’s Walter Kerr Theatre.
He will be replaced by Tom Hewitt on Jan. 3, 2023.