David Sheward — Theater Critic

Despite a serious case of miscasting, Stanley Tucci's riotous staging of Ken Ludwig's 'Lend Me a Tenor' provides an evening full of belly laughs, slapstick action, and projectiles aimed into the orchestra seats. If you want to laugh yourself silly and you're willing to duck fruit, champagne corks, and flung roses, this is the show for you. But you're going to have to suspend a huge chunk of your disbelief, and I suspect the main audience for this 1989 farce will be more than willing to do so.

After hitting a home run with Billy Joel ('Movin' Out') and striking out with Bob Dylan ('The Times They Are A-Changin' '), Twyla Tharp is back on her A game, this time with Frank Sinatra as a collaborator. 'Come Fly Away,' her tribute to the classic romanticism of one of the 20th century's greatest pop stylists, is a jazz, a gas, a cuckoo-cuckoo, ring-a-ding fling, man! There's not much of a plot, but I didn't miss one as 15 sexy, athletic dancers coupled and uncoupled to the Chairman of the Board's recorded voice combined with a rich live orchestra and augmented by the sweet crooning of featured vocalist Hilary Gardner. Kudos to sound designer Peter McBoyle for making it seem as if Sinatra were still alive and duetting with Gardner.

There's not much to Martin McDonagh's 'A Behanding in Spokane.' While this 90-minute exercise in hilarious terror shares the brutality and pitch-black humor of the Irish playwright's previous works, it doesn't have anything to say about the country of its setting (as his Gaelic-centric plays, such as 'The Beauty Queen of Leenane' and 'The Lieutenant of Inishmore,' do) or the nature of storytelling (the theme of 'The Pillowman'). It just seems as if McDonagh picked a spot on a map of the U.S. that sounded intriguing for the title, then put a psycho in a hotel room with two incredibly stupid crooks and an equally dim-bulb night clerk. Then he stirred in some Tarantino/Coen brothers–style gore, a dash of existential angst, a smattering of pop-culture references (heavy on 'The Night of the Hunter'), and hoped for a box-office hit.

There are plenty of pointed and thought-provoking exchanges, and the play's structure is sound. Several casually mentioned details later take on great significance. But Mamet, who also directs with a sure hand, fails to get beyond the editorializing to create characters with whom we can identify. Such identification may not be his intention, but it makes 'Race' more a political tract than a compelling drama.

Though its brain may be a bit simple, 'Memphis' has its heart and soul in the right place. The new musical features a rock-solid score by Bon Jovi keyboardist David Bryan, dynamic singing, and athletic dancing. On the debit side, Joe DiPietro's book reduces a traumatic period in American cultural and musical history to a bland 'Behind the Music' special, and director Christopher Ashley encourages his cast to limn broadly, blunting the impact of several potentially heart-wrenching moments.

Though its brain may be a bit simple, 'Memphis' has its heart and soul in the right place. The new musical features a rock-solid score by Bon Jovi keyboardist David Bryan, dynamic singing, and athletic dancing. On the debit side, Joe DiPietro's book reduces a traumatic period in American cultural and musical history to a bland 'Behind the Music' special, and director Christopher Ashley encourages his cast to limn broadly, blunting the impact of several potentially heart-wrenching moments.

Chris D'Arienzo's book is a theatrical Mad Libs game, with various '80s hits filling in the blanks of the miniscule plot: German developers scheme to tear down the strip's drugs-sex-and-rock district, as wannabe rock god Drew and actor-barmaid Sherry meet cute, split up, and reunite. That's about it. As directed with manic energy by Kristin Hanggi and played with an obvious wink to the audience by the hard-working cast, the show doesn't take itself seriously for one second. But the humor level is so low and the characters so broad that interest in the story is lost after the first 20 minutes. If the creative team had dispensed with the script and just let the ensemble and kick-ass onstage band tear through the hits of the era, Rock of Ages would have really rocked.

After a run last summer in Central Park, this Public Theater revival has moved indoors, and it looks like the hippies will be grooving there for a long time. In the park, the show was a combination picnic and rock concert, with audiences digging the sweet pop sounds and the energy of the attractive young cast. On Broadway, Diane Paulus' grab-bag staging takes on a more forceful narrative drive. Scott Pask replaces his sylvan set with a Peter Max–inspired crash pad, illuminated by Kevin Adams' psychedelic lighting. Michael McDonald's costumes ground us in the colorful period.

But this is a well-crafted playwriting exercise rather than a believable character study. Early on, Reza plants seemingly insignificant details like time bombs, and they explode later with devastating impact. She also knows exactly how to time a joke for maximum reaction, and she cleverly groups and regroups the combatants in different alliances so you don't always know who is on whose side. Kudos also to Christopher Hampton's adaptation from the original French, which transplants the action to tony Park Slope without any noticeable losses in transit. You can see the wiring in this precision machine, but thanks to a stellar cast and impeccable direction by Matthew Warchus, Carnage is a feast for both actors and audience.

An air of immediacy and spontaneity infuses all of Arthur Laurents' high-impact staging. He retains the original vibrancy of this street-gang Romeo and Juliet while giving it a harsh, jagged edge. Laurents, author of the book, has said he wanted to put danger back into the 1957 show, after too many productions (and the 1961 Oscar-winning film version) had made the rival Jets and Sharks seem too much like adorable musical-comedy versions of juvenile delinquents.

It's so rare that a show lives up to its hype that I was all set to be underwhelmed by Billy Elliot: The Musical, the London mega-smash based on the 2000 film about a coal miner's son who longs to join the ballet. Reports from across the pond had this tuner the greatest thing since sliced bread. Well, count me as a big old Billy fan. What could easily have become a feel-good treacle fest — particularly with the king of pop ballads, Elton John, composing the music — turns out to be one of the smartest and most satisfying Broadway musicals in years.