Today’s Highlights:
The Time Traveller’s Wife: The Musical, by Dave Stewart, Nick Finlow & Kait Kerrigan, directed by Bill Buckhurs, featuring David Hunter (Henry), Joanna Woodward (Clare), Tim Mahendran (Gomez), Hiba Elchikhe (Charisse), Ross Dawes (Henry’s Dad), Sorelle Marsh (Henry’s Mum), Alwyne Taylor (Librarian), Irfan Damani (Clare’s Dad), Alexandra Doar ( Clare’s Mum), Alex Lodge (Jason/Mark), Helena Pipe (Dr. Kendrick), and Ava Critchell, Lily Hanna, Poppy Pawson, and Holly-Jade Roberts (sharing the role of Young Clare), opens at London’s Apollo Theatre.
Rodgers & Hart’s Pal Joey, adapted by Richard LaGravenese & Daniel “Koa” Beaty, directed by Savion Glover & Tony Goldwyn, featuring Ephraim Sykes (Joey), Elizabeth Stanley (Vera), Aisha Jackson (Linda), Loretta Devine (Lucille), Brooks Ashmanskas (Melvin), and Jeb Brown (Tony), with Krystina M. Burton, Marshall L. Davis Jr., Dormeisha, Jarvis Manning, Brittany Nicole Parks, Mary Antonini, Taylor Marie Daniel, Leandra Ellis-Gaston, Jodeci Milhouse, NaTonia Monét, Rory Shirley, and Allysa Shorte, opens at NY City Center.
Manhattan Theatre Club‘s Poor Yella Rednecks, by Qui Nguyen, directed by May Adrales, featuring Jon Hoche, Ben Levin, Samantha Quan, Jon Norman Schneider, Maureen Sebastian, and Paco Tolson, opens at Off-Broadway’s New York City Center.
Inherit the Wind, by Jerome Lawrence & Robert E. Lee, directed by directed by Michael Michetti, featuring Alfred Molina (Henry Drummond), John Douglas Thompson (Matthew Harrison Brady, Chris Perfetti (E.K. Hornbeck), Abubakr Ali (Bertram Cates), David Aaron Baker (Reverend Jeremiah Brown, Jared Bybee (Dunlap/Reporter/Radio Man), Brian Calì (Meeker/Photographer/Townsperson), Marlene Forte (Mrs. Brady), Matt Gomez Hidaka (Howard Blair), Thomas Hobson (Tom Davenport/Reporter), Michael Kostroff (Mayor/Reporter), John W. Lawson (Bannister/Reporter), Philip J. Lewis (Sillers/Reporter), Gabriella Pizzigoni (Melinda Loomis), Rene Rivera (Judge/Reporter/Townsperson), and Pam Trotter (Mrs. Krebs), opens at Pasadena Playhouse.
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Reviews for Merry Me at Off-Broadway’s New York Theatre Workshop:
Theatermania (Zachary Stewart): There is an ongoing project among playwrights and directors to “queer” the canon by taking stories and characters from older plays and endowing them with a contemporary LGBT sensibility. When done well, it’s a clever way to introduce old stories to new audiences. When done poorly, it becomes a tiresome exercise in forcing fashionable manners and instantly stale cultural references onto material that doesn’t easily support them — and sometimes actively resists. Unfortunately, Hansol Jung’s Merry Me…belongs in the latter category. This comedic casserole borrows ingredients from ancient Greek drama, Restoration comedy, and Tony Kushner, yet somehow feels less than the sum of its parts. This is despite some very funny performances and a zippy DIY staging from director Leigh Silverman — both of which reveal the undercooked qualities of the script…
Time Out (Regina Robbins): …a ribald comic paean to lust… The laughs, at least, come nearly non-stop, with help from madcap performances, silly props and loads upon loads of sex… Merry Me’s structure is both deliberately formulaic—repurposing the 17th-century framework of Restoration Comedy as a celebration of queer sexual liberation—and gleefully anarchic: ignoring the fourth wall, blurring the lines between the actors and the characters they play, and cramming in more literary and pop-cultural references than you can shake a vibrator at… Director Leigh Silverman, a frequent collaborator, fully embraces Jung’s ode to sexual ecstasy, as does the cast…
New York Stage Review (David Finkle): …Merry Me, the brain teaser under consideration here, is the result of a continuing collaboration between playwright Jung and director Leigh Silverman… Admittedly, it’s about sex, but is it a comedy? From beginning to end there is dialog sometimes clearly meant to be funny and other dialog unclearly meant to be funny. Is any of it?… Throughout Merry Me there are any number of impressive references, although their accumulated meanings may not add up to anything decipherable… Synopsizing the plot is pretty much pointless. It wouldn’t go far towards revealing a logical storyline. There isn’t one…
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Broadway Grosses for the week ending Oct. 29.
Click here for the complete analysis.
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Current information on Broadway’s 2023-24 season (as of Nov. 1):
Click here for the full Broadway season.
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Manhattan Theatre Club’s Broadway production of Jocelyn Bioh’s Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, directed by Whitney White, will be available to stream all performances from Nov. 14-19. 
here.
Brittany Adebumola, Maechi Aharanwa, Rachel Christopher, Kalyne Coleman, Somi Kakoma, Lakisha May,Nana Mensah, Michael Oloyede, Dominique Thorne, and Zenzi Williams.
This dazzling world premiere welcomes you into Jaja’s bustling hair braiding shop in Harlem where every day, a lively and eclectic group of West African immigrant hair braiders are creating masterpieces on the heads of neighborhood women. During one sweltering summer day, love will blossom, dreams will flourish and secrets will be revealed. The uncertainty of their circumstances simmers below the surface of their lives and when it boils over, it forces this tight-knit community to confront what it means to be an outsider on the edge of the place they call home.
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Mame will run Nov. 2-19 at San Francisco’s Gateway Theatre, directed by Becky Potter, with choreography by Lori Wook, and music direction by Tim Fletcher.
Joey Alvarado, Jesse Caldwell, Azzy David, Mark Farrell, Cindy Goldfield, Nick Ishimaru, Tania Johnson, Elizabeth Jones, Larissa Kelloway, Lillian Kurtz, Joel Ochoa, Sarah Schori, Jillian A. Smith, Kurt Tijamo, and Elise Youssef.
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The world premiere of Gregory Thirloway & Maurice Godin’s OY! To the World – Christmas With a Twist! will run Dec. 14-23 at North Hollywood’s El Portal Theatre, directed by Maurice Godin, with choreography by Jeffrey Polk, and music direction by Gerald Sternbach.
Kelley Dorney, Tonoccus McClain, Yamuna Meleth and Jay Brian Winnick.
Shelly Abrams has inherited a shuttered Catskills lodge. He has high hopes of bringing it back with a big holiday show, like the ones his Grandparents used to stage. He has fond childhood memories of holiday celebrations at the lodge which mixed Hanukkah with other traditions. He gathers his three most talented friends from The Big Apple and an ageless accompanist that came with the place, and together they provide a mix of cultures to rekindle the spirit of the place with a show called Christmas With A Twist, seeking to recreate the warmth, love, and laughter that once filled the hall in its heyday.
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Aaron Tveit (Sweeney Todd) and Sutton Foster (Mrs. Lovett) will both join the cast of Sweeney Todd from Feb. 9 – May 5, 2024 at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre.
Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford will play their final performance on Sun. Jan. 14, 2024.
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L.A. Holiday Celebration will take place Sun. Dec. 24 from 3-6 PM at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. 
The event will also be available to watch on PBS SoCal 3-6 PM), as well as on the PBS app. Click here for additional information.
Click here for the complete list of performers (scroll down).
The event will feature a line-up of diverse L.A.-based artists and performing arts groups who will showcase their talent, artistry and holiday traditions, colorful costumes and global sounds from China, Korea, Japan, India, Mexico, France Ukraine, Bulgaria and more, this year’s participating artists hail from communities across L.A. County: from West L.A. and Culver City to Pasadena and the San Gabriel Valley, and from the northern reaches of the Antelope and San Fernando Valleys to Downtown L.A., the South Bay and South Los Angeles. Returning audience favorites include two-time GRAMMY® award-winning Mariachi Divas de Cindy Shea; 10-piece Latin jazz band Gabrielito y La Verdad; the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles; Jewish culture revival band Mostly Kosher; high energy JazzAntiqua Dance & Music Ensemble; and internationally renowned Japanese drummers TAIKOPROJECT in a collaboration with Indian-inspired Blue13 Dance Company, and more.
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MasterVoices will offer a concert presentation of Stephen Sondheim, Burt Shevelove & Nathan Lane’s The Frogs Nov. 3-4 at Jazz at Lincoln Center, directed by Ted Sperling, and hosted by Lane.
Douglas Sills (Dionysos), Keven Chamberlin (Xanthias), Marc Kudisch (Herakles), Chuck Cooper (Charon), Peter Bartlett (Pluto), Dylan Baker (George Bernard Shaw), Jordan Donica (William Shakespeare), and Candice Corbin (Ariadne), with dancers. Rei Akazawa-Smith, Lexis Danca, Maurice Dawkins, Maya Halpern-Thomas, Beatrice Howell, Ali Montez, Christopher Page-Sanders, Isabela C. Sanchez, Tommy Scrivens, Claire Waxman, Ruby Waxman, and Andrew Wilson.
In a world torn by conflict and on the brink of chaos, Dionysos, the god of wine and drama, seeks a singular savior among the playwrights. But who’s the greatest of them all? And can a poet save the culture from itself? Descend with us to Hades and find out…
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Sufjan Stevens, Justin Peck & Jackie Sibblies Drury’s Illinoise Illinoise will run Jan. 28 – Feb. 18, 2024, at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, directed & choreographed by Justin Peck, and music direction by Nathan Koci.
Casting TBA.
The musical glows around a campfire as virtuosic dancers, singers, and a live band take you on a mighty journey.
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Stages St. Louis will present its Applause Gala on Fri. Nov. 10 at 9 PM at the Kirkwood PAC.
Norm Lewis