Today’s Highlights:
The Royal Shakespeare Company’s Hamnet, adapted byLolita Chakrabarti, directed by Erica Whyman, featuring Kemi-Bo Jacobs (Agnes) and Rory Alexander (william), with Troy Alexander (Bartholomew), Nigel Barrett (John/WillKempe), Ajani Cabey (Hamnet), Saffron Dey (Judith), Victoria Elliott (Joan), Heather Forster (Eliza), Thalia Gambe (Ensemble) Karl Haynes (Ned), Ava Hinds Jones (Susanna), Nicki Hobday (Jude), Penny Layden (Mary), Matilda McCarthy (Tilly/Catherina), and Bert Seymour (Burbage/Father John), with Haydn Burke (Ensemble), opens at Chicago’s Shakespeare Theatre.
McNeal, by Ayad Akhtar, directed by Mark Clements, featuring Peter Bradbury (Jacob MeNeal), Jessica Ko (Sahra), Jeanne Paulsen (Stephie Banic Banc), Ty Fanning (Harlan), N’Jameh Carama (Natasha J’meh Carama (Natasha Braitwaite (Jameh Carma), Francine Blake (Bridget Carma), Bridgit Ann White (Francine Blake), and Sara Sadjadi (Dppti), opens at Milwaukee Rep.
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Reviews for NYC Center’s High Spirits:
Click here for all the reviews.
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A Means to an End, written by & starring J. William Bruce, will take place Sat. Feb. 21 at The Producer’s Club, directed by Wilson Jermaine Heredia.
A family drama centering on questions of identity and authorship, asking, “Who knew defining your story would be this hard?
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Mark Sonnenblick’s Midnight at the Never Get will run July 11 – Sept. 12 (opening July 20) at the Menier Chocolate Factory, directed by David Cromer.
Ben Platt, and more TBA.
Trevor Copeland and songwriter Arthur Brightman perform love songs in a Greenwnwhich Village club. The play explores their intense romance, artistic clashes, and the risks of being gay in pre-Stonewall New York, presented as a cabaret memory play.
Video: Ben Platt & Mark Sonnenblick perform “Mercy of Love.”
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Amber Ruffin & Kevin Sciretta’s Bigfoot will begin previews Feb. 11 and open Mar. 1 at New York City Center Stage 1, directed by & choreographed by Danny Mefford.
Crystal Lucas Perry, Grey Henson, Katerina McCrimmon, and Alec Moffat.
The musical follows a misunderstood, eight-foot-tall youth who becomes the target of small-town paranoia and corrupt politicians.
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The Fantasticks continues through Feb. 22 at Kansas City’s Music Theater Heritage, directed by Emily Shackelford.
Nilko Andreas, Damian Blake, Joshua Gleeson, Richard Harris, Ron Megee, Nsikoh, Tim Noland, Daniela Rodriguez Del Bosgue, Aidan Sarmiento, and Ty Tuttle.
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Mint Theatre will present Harold Brighouse’s Zack Feb. 21 – Mar. 28 at Theatre Row, directed by Britt Berke.
Jordan Mattew Brown, Caroline Festa, Grace Guichard, Davie Lee Huýnh, David T Patterson, Douglas Rees, Sean Runnette, Joy Aviagail Sudduth, and Cassia Thompson.
Zachariah Munning has a natural sweetness that is unappreciated by his family. They long ago decided he was just lazy and dim. Zack’s calculating mother and cold-blooded brother are scheming to take advantage of a rich relative who is coming to visit. They believe her wealth might solve the problem of their failing business and are ready to sacrifice Zack for their own aims.
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Manhattan Theatre Club‘s Bug, by Tracy Letts, has been extended through Mar. 8 at Broadway’s Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, directed by David Cromer.
Carrie Coon (Agnes White), and Namir Smallwood (Peter Evans), with Randall Arney (Dr. Sweet), Jennifer Engstrom (R.C.), and Steve Key (Jerry Goss).
A cult classic about an unexpected and intense romance between a lonely waitress and a mysterious drifter. What begins as a simple connection between two broken people in a seedy Oklahoma motel room twists into something far more dangerous. When reality slips out of grasp, paranoia, delusion, and conspiracy take over in this sexy psychological thriller.
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Brian Henson’s Puppet Up! will run Feb. 20, 21, 22, 27, 28 & Mar. 1 at the Montalbán Theatre.
Patrick Bristow.
This is no ordinary puppet show. It’s a night of outrageous, off-the-cuff comedy for adults only. Based on suggestions from the audience, Patrick and his team of expert puppeteers create a hilarious two-shows-in-one: the improvised puppet action projected live on screens above the stage, with the puppeteers racing around below in full view of the audience. The show also features recreations of classic pieces originally created by Jim and Jane Henson, and Frank Oz that haven’t been seen by live audiences in decades.
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Video: Norm Lewis sings “One Small Thing” in rehearsal for Monte Cristo, at Off-Brodaway’s York Theatre.
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Norah Jones, Gregg Wattenberg & Peter Duchan’s Practical Magic is currently in development, directed by Maria Friedman.
TBA.
For more than two centuries, the Owens women have been feared, blamed, and whispered about in their small Massachusetts town. Orphaned as children and raised by their eccentric aunts, sisters Sally and Gillian Owens grow up determined to escape the ancestral curse they inherited. Choosing opposite paths, the sisters try to outrun their past, until love, loss, and long-buried secrets pull them back together. Forced to confront their family legacy, Sally and Gillian must decide whether the past can be overcome—and how much they are willing to risk for love.
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Lucy Thurber’s The Locus will run Feb. 24-28 at the LAByrinth Theater, directed by Jenna Worsham.
Ngozi Anynwu, Nadira Foster-williams, and Alison Pill.
Two old friends meet once a year. Always the same motel, in the same quaint town. Always the same sweet memories and joyful traditions. Tina and Sarah are closer than sisters, and it’s always good to catch up. Or so it seems. What happens when the language you have no longer keeps the truth at bay and the ghosts away? A play about the stories we tell in order to bear the ones we can’t.