Mark Kennedy

The Broadway version opened Sunday at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre with the same leads – Adam Chanler-Berat, Celia Keenan-Bolger and Christian Borle – who made it a darling downtown at the New York Theatre Workshop last year. The cast is fantastic and hardworking and collaborative, the sets are weirdly inventive, but its trip north has not done it any favors. ... The Peter Pan prequel was commissioned by Disney Theatricals and ran in a workshop version in 2009 in La Jolla, Calif., before coming to New York. It's supposed to connect with kids and adults alike, but ends up shortchanging both with a frantic, indulgent mess.

One of Simonson's neatest tricks is using a couple of barflies to help frame parts of the play. Some of Simonson's least successful are the attempts to make the story bigger than what it is. References to busing, racism and exploitation of athletes are picked up but then dribble away.

Much of the buzz coming from the new revival 'Evita' has been about the spitfire Argentine playing the title role. But all of the heat actually comes from the guy shaking his bon-bon. Ricky Martin is easily the best thing about this revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber's bio of Eva Peron, which opened Thursday at the Marquis Theatre. He sings beautifully, dances gracefully, athletically climbs ladders, plays his role with a knowing sneer and elicits drools in his suspenders and tight white shirt. He even makes a mustache work. In fact, maybe it's time for Broadway to have a new rule: Put Ricky Martin in everything. He would fit in happily at 'Newsies.' He would definitely enliven 'Death of a Salesman.' Heck, put him in 'Mary Poppins' and watch the roof really lift off.

Both those themes are hardly touched, and some may feel this biography needs more, but 'End of the Rainbow' never intends itself to be anything but a sketch of a frail older woman falling to her demons. It's hard to watch, but even harder not to watch. That's completely because of Bennett, a veteran of the English stage, but a newcomer here. That should change quickly. At one preview, audience members shot up from their seats and coaxed one more number from Bennett, begging for one more moment, just one more, please, with Judy. There can be no better compliment.

You'll be clapping a lot during the 2 1/2-hour show — mainly just to welcome an embarrassment of riches on stage: James Earl Jones. Angela Lansbury. John Larroquette. Candice Bergen. Eric McCormack. Michael McKean and Kerry Butler. It's like a greatest hits album on stage. Director Michael Wilson gives each a moment to shine and excitingly paces the play like a thriller.

Calhoun, whose last job was directing 'Bonnie & Clyde,' has smartly brought along from that short-lived musical his Clyde (Jordan, whose looks and voice and intensity will melt many a heart) as well as Tobin Ost, the set designer. Here, Ost has created three massive rolling steel towers that get a workout as they twist and turn to resemble various cityscapes, often nicely paired with Sven Ortel's projections. 'Newsies' will likely now go from Broadway to high school auditoriums across the country. Part history lesson, part fable and part love story, it's practically got its bags packed. Hopefully, by making newsies heroic, it'll also revive the business of 'papes' – sorry, newspapers.

This 'Superstar' began life at The Stratford Shakespeare Festival and then had a final tuneup at the La Jolla Playhouse. McAnuff deserves credit for trying to make the story relevant -- a ticker at the beginning even counts back the years from 2012 to A.D. 33 for those unfamiliar with history -- but with its defiant fringe kids, boxy set, blinding lights and sneering cynicism, he ends up making it feel more like 'Rent.'

Pure, moving and inventive – these are the foundations of the irresistible production that opened Sunday, and it is a study in how to beautifully adapt a movie to the stage. In many ways, in fact, this Once is better than the original Once.

The still-vibrant, still-powerful story of Arthur Miller's Willy Loman returns to a nation now emerging from a Great Recession, awash with consumerism, disgusted by greed and where audience members are striving pointlessly to be 'well liked' on Facebook. Crisply directed by Mike Nichols and starring a heartbreaking Philip Seymour Hoffman, this 'Death of a Salesman,' which opened Thursday at the Barrymore Theatre, is now a gloomy 63-year-old mirror – the same age as Loman is in the play – held up to the world to prove that little has changed. ... Hoffman will deservedly get attention for playing one of the most iconic American stage roles with vigor, but this production gets its heart and soul from Loman's wife, played with ferocious love by Linda Emond. She is holding this family together with her nails, watching her husband fall apart, taking his abuse, soaring with his hopes, playing interference between him and her sons, and generally walking on eggshells.

The crowd on one preview night seemed game to just let Shatner be Shatner. None wore 'Star Trek' tunics or spoke Vulcan. They were happy simply to watch him boldly go. ... Perhaps it's the fact that he's approaching his 81st birthday, but Shatner seems to be dwelling a lot on mortality these days. 'Death is the final frontier,' he says at one point, a twist on the opening monologue of 'Star Trek.' There's actually a lot of death in the show. ... Yet the show somehow avoids becoming overly maudlin. 'Love is the difference between the cold light of the universe and the warmth of the human spirit,' Shatner says. 'And life doesn't have to end when love is present.' ... Shatner closes the show by performing his only song of the night — 'Real' from his 2007 album 'Has Been.' It is very much like Shatner himself, a little out of date, a little bizarre, but endearing nonetheless.

The humor in Nixon's play is grim, grim, grim and Nixon – along with director Lynne Meadow, who are both cancer survivors – have wrung out every ounce in a 100-minute, intermission-less production...In a play about ultimately reconnecting with one's humanity, Nixon is almost too hard to watch at the end. A ball of pain, and a curdling cry, is all she seems. But she ultimately achieves the state that the playwright intended: grace.

'It grows on you,' Harris' character says at the beginning of the play. She's talking about the small South African village where the action is set, but she might as well be describing the piece itself, which really only gets going in Act 2...The face-off between Elsa and the pastor has been a long time in coming — Act 1 drags on way too long simply to establish the jeopardy Miss Helen is in. The play then has a hard time deciding how to end after Miss Helen has taken the stage for her grand soliloquy, a manifesto for any artist to defy convention.

Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis lead this reconception of life in Depression-era Catfish Row and the fact that subtle changes have been made are clear as soon as Lewis appears using a cane to navigate across the stage with his malformed, twisted left leg – and not the goat cart of old. Purists upset to hear about this artistic travesty – good grief, no goat cart?! – should leave the theater immediately. The rest of us can then sit back and enjoy a first-rate cast give life to one of America's greatest love triangles and hear beautiful songs such as 'Summertime' and 'Bess, You Is My Woman Now.'

While no theatrical air ball, 'Lysistrata Jones' isn't a slam dunk, either. It's got terrific songs by Lewis Flinn and an energetic cast, but the book is too derivative, a few of the actors seem overmatched, the choreography from Dan Knechtges is merely serviceable, and there aren't enough killer jokes...When it was stumbled upon at Judson Memorial Church, there was a surprising jolt: The quality was really high in such an unusual place. But the show is now wilting under the white lights of Broadway and the air is seeping out of the ball.

The diagnosis is in for Harry Connick Jr.'s Broadway musical about a psychiatrist undergoing a psychic meltdown: It needs more time on the couch. A completely reworked 'On a Clear Day You Can See Forever,' which opened Sunday at the St. James Theatre, has some glorious voices, brilliantly trippy sets and some nifty moments, but its plot doesn't quite sing and it spends too much time oddly listless.

Diamond has something special here and her Broadway debut, which takes its name from the way entomologists observe fast-flying flies, is a refreshing chance to scrutinize an elite slice of America one rarely sees on stage and find out that their life also stinks enough to attract flies.

Jordan, who was in 'Rock of Ages,' is charisma in person, a ball of swaggering arrogance with a sad boy underneath that's catnip to Bonnie (and many of the women in the audience). Bonnie, we are told, was a ravishing redhead, and Osnes is just that — this 'Anything Goes' alumna transforms from a girl in need of attention (her sad 'How 'Bout a Dance' is beautiful) to a stone-cold fox cradling a shotgun. This is a killer combination: They will slay you, literally.

That's how a concert can be both intimate and goofy, touching and confident...The last song listed is 'You'll Never Walk Alone' from 'Carousel,' but don't get up just yet. LuPone and Patinkin aren't done, so expect an encore or two. Any why not? When you're this good, this strong, this playful, a few extra songs is a pleasure to perform and hear.

Rickman is clearly very good at playing arrogant and sneering, but he shows a touchingly vulnerable side while also delivering a lacerating monologue about what the publishing industry does to young talent and how words can really hurt. Rabe has a coltish immaturity that ages into weary pride by the end, and Linklater is excellent as the nerdy — but needy — wannabe intellectual who is really just a boy. Who turns out to be the best writer of the bunch? That's easy — Theresa Rebeck.

Director Richard Eyre and the cast succeed in a tricky balancing act for a play written in 1930: Keep the humor, but lose much of the affected, mannered performances - all those 'darlings' and 'splendids' and Coward bon mots - that often make his plays seem frothy and insubstantial. The result, which opened Thursday at the Music Box Theatre, is funny and insightful in its attempt to reconcile the notion of marriage and sexual attraction, and yet also doesn't shy away from exploring the link between lust and violence.

His voice is like the show - strong and sweet, but not terribly enlightening. His song interpretations are decidedly run-of-the-mill, straight down the middle, but nice. He works hard, stripping off his suit coat and then rolling up his sleeves, sweat stains visible. By the end, he's thanking his orchestra, high-fiving members of the audience and getting a standing ovation. And he still sparkles.

Dancy's transition from arrogant dictator to needy supplicant is first class, but Tony Award-nominated Arianda is simply fearsome. Her ability to go from dumb to powerful (also on show last season in the Broadway revival of 'Born Yesterday') is remarkable and her physicality here, from her Noo Yawk accent to crossing her legs like a longshoreman in a frilly dress, is thrilling. The last line of the play is 'Hail, Aphrodite!' but it might as well be 'Hail, Arianda!'

'Godspell,' which has long been a standard show put on in colleges and high schools, captures the best of the old and embraces the new: At intermission, some cast members stay on stage for the traditional boogie with the audience - yes, free wine is handed out - and yet this new version has the parable about Tribute to Caesar illustrated by Jesus putting a coin in a tip jar. Costumes by Miranda Hoffman remain true to that dynamic, with the use of multicolored pants and suspenders as a nod to the hippy past, and prom dresses, sneakers, a bowling shirt and leopard prints a sign of the new. It all ends badly, of course - for Jesus, not the show. The second act is a bummer, though Jesus' death is sensitively handled. But as his followers carry his body away - their faces glisten with sweat and they are visibly moved - it's clear that 'Godspell' has anointed a new group of Broadway stars and we are the richer for it.

We've all heard this scenario before: Family members gather for a fraught holiday reunion in which embarrassing family secrets - lubricated by booze and resentment - tumble out. But Jon Robin Baitz has taken that cliche and somehow made it vibrant in 'Other Desert Cities,' which had its world debut last year at Lincoln Center Theater and has now made the jump to Broadway. It opened Thursday at the Booth Theatre. The script crackles with life and so do the performances.

Hwang has built a bilingual farce about mistranslation that explores the cultural differences between China and America using two languages, and then layered a love story on top of it to illustrate the divide. This is fresh, energetic and unlike anything else on Broadway.