Today’s Highlights:
Identical, by George Stiles, Anthony Drewe & Stuart Paterson, directed by Trevor Nunn, featuring 3 sets of identical twins who share the central roles of Lottie and Lisa,: Kyla & Nicole Fox, Emme & Eden Patrick, and Sienna & Savannah Robinson, with Emily Tierney, James Darch, Gabrielle Lewis-Dodson, Louise Gold, Michael Smith-Stewart, Rico Bakker, David Bardsley, Hannah Cauchi, Paige Fenlon, Rosie Glossop, Dominic Adam Griffin, Jordan Isaac, Rutendo Mushonga, Ellie Nunn, Winter Jarrett Glasspool, Daisy Jeffcoate, Isabelle Larrey, Saffia Layla, Parrine Long, Helena Middleton, Kirsten Muzvuru, and Poppy Pawson, opens at the UK’s Nottingham Playhouse.
Ragtime, directed by Will Pomerantz, featuring Kyrie Courter (Sarah), Derrick Davis (Coalhouse), Lora Lee Gayer (Mother), Zachary Prince (Tateh), Daniel Jenkins (Father), Harrison Bryan (Younger Brother), Davon Williams (Booker T. Washington), Clyde Voce (Matthew Henson), Rachel Parker (Sarah’s Friend), Taylor Jackson (Harlem Woman), Cathryn Wake (Evelyn Nesbit), Victoria Huston-Elam (Emma Goldman), Ryan Hunt (Willie Conklin), Cecelia Ticktin (Kathleen), Will Hantz (The Boy), and Sonnie Betts (The Girl), with Ian Lowe and Brianna Kaleen, begins previews at Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theater.
Chess the Musical in Concert, directed & choreographed by Nick Winston, featuring Hadley Fraser (Anatoly), Samantha Barks (Florence), Joel Harper-Jackson (Freddie), Frances Mayli McCann (Svetlana), Ako Mitchell (The Arbiter), and Craige Els (Molokov), with Joseph Craig, Darius J James, Aoife Kenny, Jessica Lee, Nick Len, Natasha May-Thomas, Alice Readie, Joshua Robinson, Stuart Rouse, Phoebe Samuel-Gray, Grant Thresh and Libby Watts, closes at London’s Theatre Royal Drury Lane.
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Reviews for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at Off-Broadway’s Theatre at St. Clements:
New York Times (Juan A. Ramírez): …This production…has several excellent surfaces, though not all the elements rise to the occasion. Joe Rosario’s direction, for example, handles the soap opera-style histrionics well but doesn’t land much of Williams’s wicked humor. His characters can often seem aimless and airless, when they should be pointedly animated… Joe Rosario’s direction, for example, handles the soap opera-style histrionics well but doesn’t land much of Williams’s wicked humor. His characters can often seem aimless and airless, when they should be pointedly animated… The character of Maggie buckles most under this misfire…
New York Theatre Guide (Joe Dziemianowicz): …Beyond some too-pronounced performances, the key character of the author’s father is a bit too vague and generic for his — and the play’s — own good…. This production…has several excellent surfaces, though not all the elements rise to the occasion. Joe Rosario’s direction, for example, handles the soap opera-style histrionics well but doesn’t land much of Williams’s wicked humor. His characters can often seem aimless and airless, when they should be pointedly animated… The character of Maggie buckles most under this misfire… this production manages to make the bourbon-soaked setting feel like the actual South rather than a gauzy memory of the South…
Theatermania (Kenji Fujishima): …production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof that opened last night at Theatre at St. Clement’s surely didn’t intend to provoke: Does Tennessee Williams’s oft-revived 1955 drama deserve to retain its classic status today?… It’s in the second act that this production springs to some semblance of life… As Big Daddy, Le Blanc roars onto the stage with the kind of snarling energy that could only come from a man feeling a new lease on life. But it’s about an hour and 15 minutes before he appears onstage, which means audiences have had to endure Mizuno’s astonishingly lifeless characterization of Maggie…
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Reviews for Lincoln Center’s The Nosebleed at Off-Broadway’s Claire Tow Theater:
Theatermania (Kenji Fujishima): “A deeply personal therapy session” is how I describe…The Nose Bleed… Whether such unabashedly personal exorcisms mean as much to viewers as to its creators is something audience members will have to determine for themselves… What starts out seemingly unrelated to Ogawa’s own paternal issues eventually hints at a broader exploration of American and Asian cultural differences… Ogawa saves the most lacerating material for herself by playing her own father at his most unforgiving and vulnerable… With its reliance on audience-participation and metatheatrical devices, it’s as if Ogawa was so worried about coming off as too insular…
New York Theatre Guide (Joe Dziemianowicz): …a compact and peculiar work written and directed by Aya Ogawa, deserves credit for its singular storytelling approach. That’s not exactly the same as saying this autobiographical play at Lincoln Center Theater completely succeeds and satisfies. Beyond some too-pronounced performances, the key character of the author’s father is a bit too vague and generic for his — and the play’s — own good… at times it feels like a public confessional and therapy session. Unfolding in a series of vignettes over 70 minutes, the play is like a jigsaw puzzle whose pieces don’t all neatly interlock…
Talkin’ Broadway (Howard Miller): What starts out looking like an evening of quirky sketch comedy gradually transforms into a touching, tender, and, for many in the audience, a highly relatable personal tale… the Japanese-American playwright weaves a story of relationships: between mothers and their children, between adults and their own parents, between sometimes disparate cultures, and, in a very real way, between playwright and audience… The Nosebleed is imbued with audience-trusting honesty, even when it takes us for a playful stroll into Season 21 of the TV show “The Bachelorette” and introduces us to a mostly clueless character known as “White Guy” (Chis Manley)…
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To Kill a Mockingbird will not re-open on Broadway.
Aaron Sorkin and Bartlett Sher emailed the play’s cast and crew late last Thursday to inform them of the decision, and they blamed the original lad producer, Scott Rudin, who had stepped away from an active role in the show after being accused of mistreating collaborators. According to Sorkin and Sher, “At the last moment, Scott reinserted himself as producer, and for reason which are, quite frankly, incomprehensible to both of us, he stopped the play from re-opening,”
Rudin, who continued to control the rights to the stage adaptation of the Harper Lee novel, sent his own email to Sorkin and Sher on Friday, attributing the decision to the economic situation on Broadway, where overall ticket sales have lagged behind pre-pandemic levels. “I do not believe that a remount of Mockingbird would have been competitive in the marketplace.”
Sher and Sorkin described themselves in the email as “heartbroken” and said they “mourn the loss of all the jobs — onstage, backstage, and front of house — that just disappeared.” Rudin, in his email to them, said, “It’s too risky and the downside is too great. I’m sorry you’re disappointed. It’s the right decision for the long life of the show.”
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Producer Marcia Seligson (also a former best-selling journalist) has written her memoir, titled “MY MOTHER WOULD HATE THIS BOOK,“ about her adventurous life in the theatre, working with Jean Smart, Christine Baranski, Kelsey Grammer and moremoremore — as well as her travels — chasing Mother Teresa around India, camping with John Denver in Big Sur, kissing giraffes in Kenya, and moremoremore, is now available on Kindle today, and on all sites on Aug. 29. Click here to order on Amazon.
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Off-Broadway’s Kinky Boots, currently in previews, which will officially open on Aug. 25 at Stage 42, has announced its online ticket lottery, as well as details of its in-person rush policy.
* Enter the lottery any time between midnight and 3 PM the day prior to the performance.
* Winners will be drawn at 9 AM and 3 PM the day before the show.
* Winners may purchase up to two $25 tickets, plus a $4 service charge per ticket.
* Click here for more information and to enter the lottery.
Directed & choreographed by Jerry Mitchell, the cast features Callum Francis (Lola), Christian Douglas (Charlie Price), Danielle Hope (Lauren), Brianna Stoute (Nicola), Sean Steele (Don), and Marcus Neville (George), with Devin Bowles, Bella Coppola, Nick Drake, Ian Gallagher Fitzgerald, Ryan Halsayer, Matthew Michael Janisse, Lindsay Joan, Kevin Smith Kirkwood, Marty Lauter, Tommy Martiniez, Ryah Nixon, Lucas Patrana, Liz Pearce, Rickey Schroeder, David J. Socolar, Ebrin R. Stanley, Tarion Strong, Ernest T. Williams, and Maria Wirries.
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Complete casting has been announced for August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson, which will begin previews Sept. 19 and open on a date TBA at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, directed by LaTanya Richardson Jackson..
Samuel L. Jackson (Doaker Charels), Danielle Brooks (Berniece), John David Washington (Boy Willie), Trai Byers (Avery), April Matthis (Grace), Ray Risher (Lymon), Michael Potts (Wining Boy), and Nadia Daniel & Jurnee Elizabeth Swan (alternating as Marthea), with Shirine Babb, Charles Browing, Peter Jay Fernandez, Sharina Martin, Warner Miller, Doron JéPaul Mitchell, and Kim Sullivan.
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Complete casting has been announced for The Crucible, to run Sept. 14 – Nov. 5 (0pening Sept. 21) at the Olivier Theatre, directed by Lyndsey Turner. 
The production will be broadcast globally on Mar. 2, 2023.
Brendan Cowell (John Proctor), Erin Doherty (Abigail), Eileen Walsh (Elizabeth Proctor), Fisayo Akinade (Reverend Hale), Karl Johnson (Giles Corey), and Matthew Marsh (Danford), with David Ahmad, Nathan Amzi, Zoë Aldrich, Stephanie Beattie, Raphael Bushay, Sophia Brown, Halle Brown, Anushka Chakravarti, Grace Cooper Milton, Rachelle Diedericks, Hero Douglas, Henry Everett, Nick Fletcher, Jersey Blu Georgia, Aoife Haakenson, Colin Haigh, Una Herrmann, Martin Johnston, Evie Marner, Gracie McGonigal, Alastair Parker, Joy Tan, Ami Tredrea, Tilly Tremayne, and Cadence Williams.
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Randy Rainbow has announced The Pink Glasses Tour, which will run Aug. 26 – Dec. 2. Tickets go on sale Aug. 5 at 10 AM local time.
Click here to learn more and reserve tickets.
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Charles Kirsch’s podcast, “Backstage Babble,” will join forces with Dancers Over 40 to present a fun and fabulous night of “Broadway Trivia,” on Wed. Aug. 3 at 7:30 PM ET here. The evening will consist of five celebrity guests asking ten questions each to a panel of four distinguished musical theater experts (Matt Koplik, Michael Musto, Michael Portantiere, and Glenn Rosenblum).
* Loni Ackerman will ask about legendary choreographer Joe Layton (who she worked with on the original production of George M.)
* Candy Brown will ask about Chicago, (in which she appeared as June, in the original 1975 cast).
* Jim Brochu will ask about Zero Mostel (Fiddler on the Roof).
* Alix Korey will ask about Graciela Daniele (who Alix worked with on The Pirates of Penzance).
* JoAnn M. Hunter will ask about Andrew Lloyd Webber (JoAnn choreographed School of Rock, and Cinderella in the West End)
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Celebrating the Music of Sam Cooke and Marvin Gaye will take place Fri. Sept. 2 at 8 PM at NYC’s Town Hall.
Carle Cooke (Sam’s daughter), Garfield Fleming, William Hart, and Brian Owens.
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Complete casting has been announced for Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat will run Aug. 12-28 at the St. Louis Muny, directed & choreographed by Josh Rhodes, with music direction by Charlie Alterman.
Jason Gotay (Joseph), Jessica Vosk (Narrator), Eric Jordan Young (Jacob/Potiphar), and Mykal Kilgore (Pharaoh), with Gabriel Amato, Becca Andrews, Matthew Davies, Drew Elhamalawy, Sean Ewing, Anna Gassett, Michael Hartung, Darron Hayes, Sydney Jones, Evan Kinnane, Kamal Lado, Ben Lanham, Marissa Levesque, Tiffany Rae Mallari, UJ Mangune, Sarah Meahl, Natalia Nieves-Melchor, Erica Messonnier, Collin Milfort, Harris Milgrim, Hayley Podschun, Spencer Ramirez, Emilie Renier, John Scherer, and Hannah Whitley.
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Eric Ulloa’s “Mike’s Army” will begin filming in NYC this month (release date TBA), directed by Andrew Keenan-Bolger.
Nicholas Dantes (Mikey), Claybourne Elder (Chad Hartman), Krystina Alabado (Autumn Jones), Shuga Cain (Lady Slay), Jennifer Sanches (Mom), and Timmy Thompson (Brian).
16-year-old Mickey Alvarez finds himself at a pivotal moment – that moment when you know it’s time to be open and honest about what you’re feeling inside and finally speak your truth. Not feeling quite ready for such a moment, Mikey unwittingly conjures courage from a trio of fierce and fabulous guides who appear in an explosion of glitter and glitz. Can a Drag Queen, and international Pop star, and an action film heartthrob tackle a mission this big and give Mikey the confidence he needs?