David Cote — Theater Critic

In its spareness and dreamy drift from fragmentary scene to direct address, director Arin Arbus’s superbly focused and balanced production inevitably brings to mind Our Town, but with ecological dread and greater social anomie. The ghost of Thornton Wilder surely perched on Koogler’s shoulder during the composition. This current production remounts the one Clubbed Thumb premiered in Summerworks two years ago and remains a model of less-is-more eloquent restraint.

While the design team does much dramaturgical lifting, the acting is equally superb. Just when you think you’ve seen every vocal twang or behavioral quirk from the longtime secret weapon Paul Sparks, he whips up another virtuosic portrait of a damaged, complicated weirdo (they tend to be more country than urban).

I don’t care how balsa-weak that joke is (will I be the 14th hack to use it, or the only one lacking self-restraint?). Redwood rhymes with deadwood, the derogatory term for people or things that no longer serve a function. Menzel has plenty to give. She could be the greatest squandered resource on Broadway in decades, which makes this well-intentioned misfire more frustrating: they are literally hanging Menzel out to dry.

It’s a pity: The Antiquities is a compelling concept and Harrison has a poetic, philosophical bent, but the execution lacks a certain audacity. One wonders what Caryl Churchill would have made of the premise (as with Love and Information, she’s master of the short, sharp shock). Not even a tightly directed cast and boldly designed production can overcome the sense that we’ve seen these tropes before on screens.

English premiered in 2022 at the Atlantic Theater Company and the following year Toossi won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. As now, I found the earlier iteration engaging, a wistful indie film with a magic-hour glow that suggests Terrence Malick gigging Off Broadway. Knud Adams translates his impeccable production to a Broadway venue without losing any of the original intimacy or fine-grained naturalism. The director smartly brings his superlative designers from the Atlantic: Marsha Ginsberg with her modular, deracinated classroom rotating in black void; evocative sunlight and streetlight by Reza Behjat filtering through pale amber curtains; and Enver Chakartash’s costumes—Western streetwear accented with jewel-toned scarves and accessories. Between this intensely focused and sensitive staging and his no-less powerful handling of Primary Trust, Adams must be on top of every young playwright’s vision board. Whatever dialect he’s speaking, it’s welcome on the ear. My mentor Babilla had crazier, more experimental tastes, but even he would have smiled to hear the music of his mother tongue.

Purists or anyone allergic to experimental-theater tropes (metatheatrical gags, presentational acting, deadpan delivery) may flee at intermission. At my performance, a few did. It helps to read the original libretto or watch the 1936 film before going. I did both, which help me appreciate how the staging scraped away a century of cultural rust and sentimentality to reveal an often deeply sad and frequently funny masterpiece of music-theater. Full disclosure: It was the first Show Boat I ever saw live. Will it be my last? Centenary’s coming in two years. Will the country have moved on so much that no rewrite would justify a return to Broadway? Or will Ol’ Man River roll backwards, sweeping us into a past where we don’t belong and don’t want to live?

Purists or anyone allergic to experimental-theater tropes (metatheatrical gags, presentational acting, deadpan delivery) may flee at intermission. At my performance, a few did. It helps to read the original libretto or watch the 1936 film before going. I did both, which help me appreciate how the staging scraped away a century of cultural rust and sentimentality to reveal an often deeply sad and frequently funny masterpiece of music-theater. Full disclosure: It was the first Show Boat I ever saw live. Will it be my last? Centenary’s coming in two years. Will the country have moved on so much that no rewrite would justify a return to Broadway? Or will Ol’ Man River roll backwards, sweeping us into a past where we don’t belong and don’t want to live?

At the end of, shall we say, a testing year, it seems perverse to cheer for a malignant narcissist, a thieving liar, a fake patriot and toxic parent who exploits their children in bitter pursuit of fame. But if the world has become a sad, sleazy circus, more reason to welcome the consolation of art. The miraculous Audra Mcdonald blooms as Rose in what may be the most heartstopping Gypsy you’ll ever see. The fifth Broadway revival of this shatterproof classic, and the third I’ve witnessed after those starring Bernadette Peters and Patti LuPone, the current version carries a thousand-volt electrical charge and lands at the Majestic with the force of a tornado. McDonald is the thunder-tossing center of that tempest, reminding us that the root of Audra means storm.

The whole ensemble excels, firmly steered by director Anna D. Shapiro to a hilarious state of bureaucratic and ethical crisis. In the end, consensus is reached, and the community heals—but not without a sacrificial lamb. I left the Friedman Theatre equally amused and disturbed: If a coterie of smart, morally sophisticated citizens devolves into chaos, what hope does a nation of poorly educated yahoos have? There’s no germ that spreads as fast as stupid.

Shakespeare never lacks for juicy insults, and King Lear is especially thick with verbal abuse. The unhinged title monarch viciously curses his daughter Goneril with rot in her ovaries and there’s a comically long string of invective the disguised Kent heaps upon villainous servant Oswald in front of Gloucester’s castle. In the trimmed version now running at The Shed I particularly miss one put-down—again, between Kent and Oswald. “Thou whoreson zed!” Kent sneers. “Thou unnecessary letter!” Gone from this sped-through, two-hour cut. But what would you expect? This is an unnecessary Lear.

A little too neatly, if we’re being honest. Mantell’s play suffers from poky pacing and schematic storytelling in its attempt to balance quirky romcom and ecological wakeup call. Despite running only 95 minutes, the piece drags in the middle as the characters each get an obligatory monologue about their experience surviving the disaster. Director Sivan Battat establishes a rather too cozy and laid-back vibe, but the writing’s also to blame as coincidences and heavy-handed plot twists pile up and the plot teeters between semi-surreal and plausible. Still, there are lovely speeches here and there.

Apart from the Zoomer window dressing, Gold engages in thoughtful and amusing double casting. Sola Fadiran plays both Capulet and Lady Capulet, neatly distinguishing between the husband and wife without overdoing gender stereotypes. Capulet’s angry rant at the recalcitrant Juliet is especially terrifying. The absolutely electric Tommy Dorfman is a study in opposites as Juliet’s daffy, chatty Nurse and ice-cold killer Tybalt. Gían Pérez takes on various clown roles, such as the douchey Paris and feckless Peter. The always-stunning Gabby Beans plays both Mercutio and Friar Lawrence with tremendous panache and humor. Both characters think they know what’s best for Romeo yet end up hastening his self-destruction. Beans’s Mercutio is an acid-tongued stoner perpetually in shades, whereas the friar is a gentle, optimistic soul. She juggles a third character speaking Chorus lines and delivering exasperated edicts from the Duke of Verona. The first act ends as a bloody brawl on a bed of flowers an alarming juxtaposition of brutality and romance. Choreographer Sonya Tayeh gives the movement her signature mix of muscularity and abandon. In the final scene (a bit rushed perhaps so Gold could keep the action more or less at two hours) Romeo and Juliet die splayed over each other. Their cruciform positioning mirrors the giant LED crucifix against the wall behind the DJ. A pretty tableau, but nothing terribly deep. You could say the same of other directorial flourishes, but they’re easily overlooked, since the language is well-delivered and the ensemble appealing. It’s the least boring or cringe Shakespeare I’ve seen in a long time.

All that luscious black-and-white video, the backstage winks, the fuck-you deadpan in fuck-me boots—it’s fun. I never expected to have fun at an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. (Even this summer’s queer ballroom makeover of Cats was, well, Cats.) Lloyd’s camp yet surgical staging fuses form and content: it’s the resurrection of a faded (kitsch) icon, a critique of the invasive camera, a cosplay of the BDSM rituals of celebrity and fandom. Just as Scherzinger inhabits Norma within giant neon quotation marks, the whole production seems to admit the overall musical is trash. What happens if you dress up trash as art and stick a camera in its face? Twenty feet high, those faces—coldly sensual graven images—demand your abject worship. It’s a thin line (movie-screen thin) between glamour and horror. “We gave the world new ways to dream,” an enraptured Norma sings. Lloyd finds new ways to give us nightmares; who wants to wake?

All that luscious black-and-white video, the backstage winks, the fuck-you deadpan in fuck-me boots—it’s fun. I never expected to have fun at an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. (Even this summer’s queer ballroom makeover of Cats was, well, Cats.) Lloyd’s camp yet surgical staging fuses form and content: it’s the resurrection of a faded (kitsch) icon, a critique of the invasive camera, a cosplay of the BDSM rituals of celebrity and fandom. Just as Scherzinger inhabits Norma within giant neon quotation marks, the whole production seems to admit the overall musical is trash. What happens if you dress up trash as art and stick a camera in its face? Twenty feet high, those faces—coldly sensual graven images—demand your abject worship. It’s a thin line (movie-screen thin) between glamour and horror. “We gave the world new ways to dream,” an enraptured Norma sings. Lloyd finds new ways to give us nightmares; who wants to wake?

Butterworth writes sprawling, talky epics with ensembles in the double digits, three-hour run times, and lots of room for showy speeches. He’s fascinated by the death of dreams and the past that haunts us, the slow decay of England. Hills is not essentially different, thought it does focus on women. Men in this world—save one—are feckless husband-enablers and punching bags for Veronica and her mostly unhappy grown daughters. The one man who makes a definitive impact on the Webb household is the Yank talent scout, Luther, played by New York stage veteran David Wilson Barnes. Seeming at first a dryly reserved finder of genius (he claims to have discovered Nat King Cole), Luther reveals darker motives by requesting a private audition with 15-year-old Joan (Lara McDonnell) in “Mississippi” (Seaview’s rooms are named after American states). What makes the offstage encounter between Luther and Joan more disturbing is the suggestion that the girl initiates it—a tragic escape from her suffocating surroundings.

Forbidden Broadway is a goof, but a virtuosic and stylish one, with infectious comic verve and lyrics that range from wittily inspired to boldly dumb (rhyming “earplugs” with “queer drugs”). It’s Mad Magazine with jazz hands; Saturday Night Live with people who can actually sing and dance; the antidote to hate watching; and a much-needed immunization for the season.

Forbidden Broadway is a goof, but a virtuosic and stylish one, with infectious comic verve and lyrics that range from wittily inspired to boldly dumb (rhyming “earplugs” with “queer drugs”). It’s Mad Magazine with jazz hands; Saturday Night Live with people who can actually sing and dance; the antidote to hate watching; and a much-needed immunization for the season.

Back in 2011, I enjoyed Sleep No More; it was novel and exquisitely executed, plus I dug the Macbeth meets Kubrick vibe. But even the Punchdrunk hit left me with zero desire to return. These Choose Your Own Adventure stunts combine my least favorite states: feeling trapped, being forced to follow a crowd, claustrophobia, FOMO, and humorless dance theater. On top of that, Life and Trust is too long to sustain interest in its heavy-handed Faustian spin on American capitalism. In terms of content, the “what” is mid, but the “how” is crazily busy—to the point of exhausting. You would think that an immersive event—sweaty, physical, three-dimensional—is the polar opposite of bodiless, isolating social media, yet I found the torrents of trivial visual information and absence of thoughtful language to resemble, well, wasted hours online. But, hey: You’re young, attend spin class, love escape rooms, and don’t care about narrative coherence. For you, Life and Trust may be a gold mine of fun.

In its slow-burning and fitfully engaging middle, Job ramps up from Boomer-versus-Millennial jousting to a rather contrived Big Twist, left unresolved by an ambivalent shrug of an ending. The rickety whole rests on a couple of prolonged teases. First: is Jane reliable or crazy? Can we trust anything she says; do periodic bursts of noise and light (designed by Cody Spencer and Mextly Couzin) suggest a mind fracturing under trauma? The second big mystery: does Loyd lead a horrific double life? Neither scenario is adequately deepened or resolved. She might be nuts; he might be a criminal. Unlike superior two-handers—like Oleanna or Blackbird—in which men and women square off over meaty dramatic issues, Friedlich coasts on withholding information and padding out back story (Jane’s sad childhood, sadder romantic life). As with many writers who grew up in the golden age of TV, his dialogue is slick, the humor glibly dark. Still, a content moderator deranged by work has been explored more deftly elsewhere, such as Anna Moench’s 2021 Sin Eaters, livestreamed by Theatre Exile during the pandemic.

Escola’s splendidly nasty queer romp has hiked up its petticoats and staggered uptown from a sold-out run at the Lucille Lortel Theatre, goosing a sleepy Broadway summer. I’m happy to report that although director Sam Pinkleton leveled up the production values (particularly in the musical finale), Oh, Mary! remains the same vicious, dirty-minded, bad-taste farce that delighted camp aficionados last winter. In a theater scene squeezed between the Scylla of nonprofit precarity and Charybdis of commercial desperation, Escola and their team offer audacity, flair, and a homing instinct for the audience funny bone.

Escola’s splendidly nasty queer romp has hiked up its petticoats and staggered uptown from a sold-out run at the Lucille Lortel Theatre, goosing a sleepy Broadway summer. I’m happy to report that although director Sam Pinkleton leveled up the production values (particularly in the musical finale), Oh, Mary! remains the same vicious, dirty-minded, bad-taste farce that delighted camp aficionados last winter. In a theater scene squeezed between the Scylla of nonprofit precarity and Charybdis of commercial desperation, Escola and their team offer audacity, flair, and a homing instinct for the audience funny bone.

Kirkwood takes big, violent, not fully satisfying swings, but one must bow before her women. Even though this ensemble can’t “save” the play, I was grateful to witness both. Will it take another 75 years for such a cluster of talent to burn across the heavens? Keep looking up.

As he did with the superbly energetic and irreverent revival of Purlie Victorious last year, director Kenny Leon maintains a galloping pace. Home is such a verbal dynamo it could be performed on a bare stage, yet Leon has assembled a valuable design team: Arnulfo Maldonado’s homely yet mythic sets of porch, tobacco field, and a cutaway silhouette of a house; earth-toned and soft-textured costumes by Dede Ayite; and sunny daytimes and jazzy night shades conjured by Allen Lee Hughes. The acting trio makes gorgeous music. Kittles ages up from hellraising teen to weathered old man by graceful degrees, and Inge and Ayers do magnificent character work with dozens of supporting parts—preachers, drug dealers, prison guards, bus drivers. We should mourn the fact that Williams never got to see this luminous production, but it seems he had plans to join that fellow in Miami.

Jo Bonney’s flat, face-value staging only underscores the glibness of the script (the overarching it-was-only-a-death-dream conceit apparently gives Scheer the freedom to indulge in clunkers and cliches). The Second Stage Theatre production design is crisp and mostly effective, with Cho’s prim deconstruction of a grassy lawn and appalling detonations simulated by Jeff Croiter’s harsh lighting and Darron L. West concussing sound effects. The overqualified cast does what it can with a flimsy dramaturgical conceit. You feel for them. When a show squanders Halston, Carr, Ashe, and the magnetic Siff in such pseudo-topical trifle, it’s a criminal misuse of great women—even if it doesn’t rise to a war crime.

Malloy (juggling book, music, lyrics, and orchestrations) produces lovely passages, but dramatic tension and character development is where Three Houses starts to wobble on its foundations and devolves into an allegorical anthology with diminishing returns. Narration and description take up so much text, the action stalls in passive self-regard. Alternating speaking and singing might have been a wiser tactic or tightening each episode by ten minutes. For a writer inspired by loneliness, Molloy should seek out creative company: a book writer, for example, who could help shape his prodigious musical imagination, and push back when he blows too hard.