Today’s Highlights:
Christmas in Connecticut – A New Musical, by Patrick Pacheco, Erik Forrest Jackson, Jason Howland & Amanda Yesnowitz, directed by Amy Anders Corcoran, featuring Audrey Cardwell (Liz Sandor), Ed Dixon (Alexander Yardley), Matt Bogart (Victor Beecham), Josh Breckenridge (Jefferson Jones), Raymond J. Lee (Dudley Beecham), James Judy (Felix Bassenak), Tina Stafford (Norah O’Connor), and Rashidra Scott (Gladys Higgenbottom, with Matthew Curiano, Rachel Fobbs, Julie Kavanagh, Emily Larger, Brendan McGrady, Melvin Tunstall III, Ty-Gabriel Jones, and Jamie Zeidman, opens at CT’s Goodspeed Musicals.
Joy The Musical, world premiere by Ken Davenport & AnnMarie Milazzo, directed by directed by Casey Hushion, featuring 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, opens at NJ’s George Street Playhouse.
Porchlight Revisits The Apple Tree (by Sheldon Harnick, Jerry Bock & James Coopersmith), directed Frankie Leo Bennett, Jamal Howard, and Laura Savage, featuring Jonah Cochin, Madison Denault, Susan Hofflander, Shea Hopkins, Ruchir, Khazanchi, Michael Mejia, Leah Morrow, Emma Rosenthal, and Ciarra Stroud, opens at Chicago’s Porchlight Music Theatre.
Chriskirkpatrickmas: A Boy Band Christmas Musical, written & directed by Valen Shore & Alison Zatta, featuring Valen Shore & Alison Zatta, opens at LA’s The Actors Company.
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Reviews for The Far Country at Off-Broadway’s Atlantic Theatre Company:
NY Times (Alexis Soloski): …Lloyd Suh’s fluid, artful The Far Country… Set in the early decades of the 20th century, in both China’s Guangdong Province and San Francisco, it examines the cost — literal and emotional — of immigration. Those who have suffered in their pursuit of a larger, more prosperous life might, the play suggests, inflict that same suffering on others. Then again, they might also find redemption… Suh and Ting aren’t interested in easy answers; there’s a more sophisticated moral calculus at play here… Like Suh’s other plays, The Far Country meditates on ethnicity and identity. It is also an act, loving and sorrowful, of reclamation, salvaging the history of early generations of Chinese Americans…
New York Theatre Guide (Joe Dziemianowicz): …One of Suh’s strengths is his ability to mix realism and poetic elements… The timeline could be clearer, along with an indication of why these Chinese men and women risked so much to be in the U.S. They faced so many hardships there… One of Suh’s strengths is his ability to mix realism and poetic elements. He uses that here as he shines a light on a dark slice of American history and builds a play around it. The timeline could be clearer, along with an indication of why these Chinese men and women risked so much to be in the U.S. They faced so many hardships there.. director Eric Ting guides a uniformly excellent cast…
Theatermania (Kenji Fujishima): … a topical value to plays like Suh’s that remind us of America’s shameful past of Asian American bigotry. But in The Chinese Lady and parts of The Far Country, Suh also evinces a poetic sensibility that occasionally offsets his underlying didactic impulses… As a history lesson, The Far Country is enlightening, sobering, even at times enraging. As drama, Suh’s play is on shakier ground… And while its second half is rarely less than thoughtful, nothing in it ever quite matches the haunting poetry of the concluding sequence of its first half, in which Suh strikes a surreal note in dramatizing what he describes in his script as “a liminal space”…
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Andrew Lloyd Webber, David Zippel & Emerald Fennel’s Bad Cinderella will begin previews Feb. 17 and open Mar. 23 at the Imperial Theatre, directed by Laurence Connor.
Linedy Genao (Cinderella), Carolee Carmello (Stepmother), Grace McLean (Queen), Jordan Dobson (Sebastian), Morgan Higgins (Marie), Sami Gayle (Adele), and Christina Acosta Robinson (Godmother), and more TBA.
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A mini-national tour of Broadway’s Into the Woods will run June 27 – July 30 (opening June 29) at the Ahmanson Theatre, directed by Lear deBessonet, with music supervision by Rob Berman, and choreographed by Lorin Latarro.
Montego Glover (Witch), Stephanie J. Block (The Baker’s Wife), Sebastian Arcelus (The Baker), Gavin Creel (Cinderella’s Prince/Wolf), Cole Thompson (Jack), Katy Geraghty (Little Red Ridinghood), David Patrick Kelly (The Narrator), Nancy Opel (Cinderella’s Stepmother), Aymee Garcia (Jack’s Mother), Ta-Nika Gibson (Lucinda), Brooke Ishibashi (Florinda), Kennedy Kanawagwa (Milky White), Jim Stanek (The Steward), and Alysia Velez (Rapunzel), with more TBA.
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Video: Lea Michele performs “I’m the Greatest Star”
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Amy Herzog’s newly revised version of A Doll’s House will run Feb. 13 – May 14 (opening Mar. 9) at the Hudson Theatre, directed by Jamie Lloyd.
Jessica Chastain and more TBA.
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A limited run revival of Tim Minchin & Danny Rubin’s Groundhog Day will run May 20 – Aug. 12 (opening June 8) at the Old Vic, directed by Matthew Warchus, with choreography by Lizzi Gee, and music direction by Alan Berry.
Andy Karl and more TBA.
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RIP: Quentin Oliver Lee, known for his richly resonant baritone, passed away Dec. 1 at the age of 34, six months after he revealed he had stage four colon cancer.
His final Broadway run was in the 2021 revival of Caroline, Or Change, where Mr. Lee understudied the dual role of The Bus and The Dryer. Originally a performer in the worlds of classical music and opera, Mr. Lee was a vocal swing as well as a Porgy and Crown understudy in the touring production of Porgy and Bess in 2013, which led to his Broadway debut as an understudy in Prince of Broadway. He later assumed the title role in the national tour of The Phantom of the Opera.
Operatically, Mr. Lee performed the roles of Giuseppe in The Gondoliers, Raimondo in Lucia di Lammermoor, and Pandolfe in Cendrillon for the New York Lyric Opera Theater, as well as the title role in Gianni Schicchi, Sid in Albert Herring, and Belcore in L’elisir D’amore for the NAU Opera.
Mr. Lee’s final onstage performance came Off-Broadway, in Heather Christian’s Oratorio For Living Things. He is survived by his wife, Angie, and his daughter, Samantha.
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Miss: Broadway’s Women Songwriters concert presentation, conceived, co-written & directed by Kate Baldwin & Georgia Stitt, will run Dec. 10-12 at NYC’s 92Y.
Kay Swift, Mary Rodgers, Micki Grant, Lucy Simon and Elizabeth Swados, Jeanine Tesori, Lisa Kron, Sara Bareilles, Erin McKeown and Quiara Alegria Hudes.
Kate Baldwin, Kennedy Kanagawa, Bryonha Marie Parham, Nicholas Rodriguez, and Emily Skeggs.
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Evita will run May 14 – July 16 at Cambridge’s A.R.T., directed by Sammi Cannold.
Casting & creative team TBA.
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Chicago’s Goodman Theatre‘s 18th annual New Stages Festival (already in progress) continues through Dec.18.
(in rep)
This Happened Once at the Romance Depot off the I-87 in Westchester (Dec. 1-18), by Gina Femia, directed by Kimberly Senior.
Rust (Dec. 4-17), by Nancy García Loza, directed by Laura Alcalá Baker.
(Dec. 17-18)
White Monkey, by Charlie Oh, directed by Eric Ting
Fever Drams (of Animals on the Verge of Extinction, by Jeffrey Lieber, directed by Susan V. Booth.
Modern Women (Dec. 18), by Omer Abbas Salem, directed by Lavinia Jadhwani.
What Will Happen to the All That Beauty, by Donja R. Love (Dec. 18), directed by Malika Oyetimein.
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“Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2023” will air sat. Dec. 31 at 8 PM ET/5 PM PT on ABC.
Ben Platt, Aly & AJ, Halle Bailey, dove Cameron, Billy Porter, Ciara, D-Nice, Fitz & The Tantrums, Maddie &Tae, Shaggy, Tomorrow x Together, Bailey Zimmerman, Lauren Spencer Smith, Wiz Khalifa, Finneas, Armani White, Betty Who, and Nicky Youre.
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Off-Broadway’s Stomp, created & directed by Luke Cresswell & Steve McNicholas, will end its (almost) 29-year run on Jan. 8, 2023 at Off-Broadway’s Orpheum Theatre, after 13 previews and 11,472 regular performances.
(current): Alan Asuncion, Micah Cowher, John Gavin, Desmond Howard, Jayme Overton, Tamii Sakurai, Emmanuel “Manny” Scott, and Reggie Talley.
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A new revival of Evita will run May 14 – July 16 at Cambridge’s A.R.T., directed by Sammi Cannold.
Casting and additional creative team TBA.
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Jason Kim & the Woodshed Collective’s KPOP will close Sun. Dec. 11 at Broadway’s Circle in the Square, directed by Teddy Bergman.
Zachary Noah Piser, Eddy Lee, Julia Abueva, Major Curda, Jinwoo Jung, Jiho Kang, Amy Keum, James Kho, Jully Lee, Timothy H. Lee, Abraham Lim, Kate Mina Lin, Augie Merrylees, Patrick Park, John Yi, Bo Hyung Kim, Min Young Lee, and Kevin Woo, with Marina Kondo, Joshua Lee, and Lina Rose Lee.
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Off-Broadway’s Red Bull Theater will present a benefit concert performance of Hal Lester, Danny Apolinar & Donald Driver’s Your Own Thing on Mon Dec. 12 at 7:30 PM at NYC’s Symphony Space, directed by Gabriel Barre.
Eddie Cooper, Lilli Cooper, Santino Fontana, Lesli Margherita, and Jennifer Sánchez, with Simon Pearl, Michael Pilato, Vaden Thurgood, and more TBA.
Kate Burton, Michael Cerveris, Robert Cuccioli, Tovah Feldshuh, Richard Kind, Ken Page, Patrick Page, Laila robins, Jay O. Sanders, Mary Testa, John Douglas Thompson, Michael Urie, Bruce Vilanch, and more TBA.
A storm shipwrecks an up-and-coming music duo, twins Viola and Sebastian. The pair end up in the land of Illyria, which looks very much like New York City, circa 1968. And the rest is Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night–well, kind of.
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Danny Rubin & Tim Minchin’s Groundhog Day will run May 20 – Aug. 12, 2023 at the Old Vic, directed by Mathew Warchus, with choreography by Lizzi Gee, and music supervision by Christopher Nightingale.
Andy Karl (Phil Connors) and more TBA.