Michael Dale — Theater Critic

In a Broadway season that is shaping up as one to feature far more diversity on stage than what is typically seen, it's wonderful to see a new, original and daring musical drama like Allegiance come to town in a high-profile production with a predominantly Asian cast playing out a history lesson about institutionalized racism in America.

For as long as director Jerry Mitchell and choreographer Sergio Trujillo can keep their new Broadway musical in motion, and they do so for nearly all of its wonderfully vivacious and entertaining first act, On Your Feet is a dazzling display of Latin-American musical culture, telling the professional and romantic story of Gloria and Emilio Estefan...Bookwriter Alexander Dinelaris'...cleverest move is to ignore chronology, letting the songs serve the situations...Ana Villafane makes an impressive Broadway debut as Gloria, growing from a shy teen to a confident professional...As Emilio, Josh Segarra is a strong and sympathetic presence...On Your Feet's second act suffers from a common trap when jukebox musicals turn dramatic; there are no songs that specifically address the issues at hand. With little to dance about, the show drags its heels to the plot's triumphant finish that immediately blasts into a boisterious finale, full of spangled costumes and energetic dance solos.

As Great Britain's oldest prince to ascend to the throne (he'll be turning 67 this month), the excellent Tim Pigott-Smith combines the weary countenance of one who has been dragged through the mud for decades with the brash enthusiasm of a new ruler ready to make his mark in history; though he's aware he has comparatively little time to do so. The text fluidly explains in dialogue how Britain's monarch holds a symbolic, apolitical position and is kept abreast of parliamentary matters by the country's true leader, the prime minister.

Director Evan Cabnet's gorgeously understated mounting of Helen Edmundson's adaptation looks like a somewhat faded oil painting come to life...The first-rate cast has Keira Knightley's introverted Thérèse subtly expressing the acceptance of her sorrow, so that when unfamiliar urges take over it allows merely the slightest change of physicality to clearly state that she's overwhelmed by raw emotions she has no idea how to control. Matt Ryan's Laurent is a master manipulator of women who is so taken with the instinctively sexual Thérèse that he, too, loses control. Gabriel Ebert's gangly and adolescently humored Camille resembles a repulsive Dickins caricature. Judith Light is quietly threatening as the aunt...Thérèse Raquin may no longer have the ability to shock audiences, except for the fact that its immorality is expressed with such thoughtful delicacy.

No, this not a reinvented version of CAROUSEL that's opened at the Cort, but the first Broadway production of A.R. Gurney's clever and off-beat 1995 comedy, Sylvia. On the surface, the play is about a married man in Manhattan who bonds with a stray dog in Central Park who has a tag around her neck saying Sylvia, and takes her home, much to the consternation of his wife. As scripted, Sylvia is played by a woman dressed in normal clothing that merely suggests her identity as a dog. And while the play is a breezy, hip and sentimental comedy, there's always the visual subtext of a young woman happily and unconditionally fawning over the older man who keeps her at the end of a leash.

By Broadway standards, the intimate Helen Hayes theatre might be considered the Main Stem's version of an eight foot by eight foot platform, so Dames at Sea's premiere Broadway production is also a tiny affair featuring six actors with more or less equal-sized roles. Anna Louizos' fine set changes at intermission, but stays just the way it is for each of the two acts. There are no dark moods in Ken Billington and Jason Kantrowitz lighting and director/choreographerRandy Skinner's staging plays out to the house. Under such conditions, actors have no production values to cling to.Dames at Sea offers only one special effect. Talent. Lots of it. And it's right smack in the middle of the stage for all to clearly see.

The hottest ticket in town at The Public, Hamilton has only grown as a phenomenon with its move to Broadway, with its web site advising customers that good seats will start becoming available in January. And while some have pondered if Hamilton's success signals Broadway's greater acceptance of diverse contemporary music, the musical's major appeal is as old as Rodgers and Hammerstein: good writing. They loved it in the 1700s, and they're loving it now.

The breathtaking new Broadway musical inspired from Vincente Minnelli's 1951 film An American In Paris is not ballet choreographerChristopher Wheeldon's first Broadway credit, but it's his first as a director/choreographer, and one can't help thinking of the greatest work of Robbins as dramatic stage pictures and ravishing movements swiftly and effectively reveal emotions that would require pages of dialogue. It isn't just the dancing that's impressive; it's how Wheeldon places the evening in a heightened reality that embraces a people's desire to wake from a nightmare and get back to the business of artistic creation.

...it's a rare and wonderful thing to see director Moritz von Stuelpnagel's aggressively punk production, which started at the 99-seat Ensemble Studio Theatre and was then plunked by MCC into Off-Broadway's Lortel, now gracing Shubert Alley...Before you know it, it turns out that Askins' drama, as well as Jason's puppet, has some powerful teeth. Though uproariously funny at times, the serious-minded production will have the more squeamish playgoers averting their eyes at the bloody and desperate climax...In order for Broadway to seriously claim itself to be the heart of American theatre, more plays like this need to be produced there regularly. Hollywood stars and pop music icons may bring in the crowds, but nothing beats good writing, adventurous ideas and major attitude.

Director Scott Ellis' Roundabout mounting has its good points, one great point, and its disappointments, but the material by Comden, Green and Coleman (even with this staging's numerous and unnecessary cuts and additions) is certainly good enough to provide a terrific night out, even with a mediocre production. The one spectacular plus is the superlative performance of Kristin Chenoweth, whose unique comic brio is perfectly suited to Comden and Green's intellectual eccentricities. Her Lily perfectly spoofs platinum blonde Hollywood sex appeal while exemplifying its most desirable traits. Her vocal dexterity mines the humor of the most innocent-seeming lines and she can draw enormous laughs with the most casual of reactions. Her soprano soars with clarity and comical exuberance. It's a sterling performance worthy of being the career highlight of a Broadway star.

Yes, Larry David's Fish In The Dark is closer in spirit to a rock star's live appearance than anything resembling the emergence of an important new voice in American theatre, but once you accept it for what it is, the kind of well-oiled joke machine that put plenty of fannies in Broadway seats during the 1960s, it's a really fun night out...Directed by the overqualified Anna D. Shapiro, the evening runs briskly, despite the star being a 'low-talker' with an aversion to cheating his body out so the audience can see his face clearly...it's the stage-savvy veterans who strike comic gold...'It's real, and it's spectacular' may be stretching it a bit, but Fish In The Dark is, at the very least, pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty good.

Fifteen months ago the news out of Milburn, New Jersey's Paper Mill Playhouse was that composer/lyricist Jason Robert Brown, most known for musicalizing emotional subjects like a Southern lynching or the crumbling of a five-year romance, had, just for the moment, dumped the artsy st

Nathan Lane holds the dubious distinction of being one of Broadway's biggest stars while also being one of the stage's most underappreciated actors. Though four Tony Award nominations and two wins is rather nice, it's astonishing to think that someone so highly regarded as one of the few remaining stage stars nationally known primarily for acting in the theatre has gone sixteen times without a nomination. Whether or not number nineteen garners him the honor remains to be seen, but in the first ten minutes or so of Terrance McNally's wickedly funny offstage farce, It's Only A Play, Lane demonstrates why he is undoubtedly one of the greatest stage actors of his generation.

...the story is secondary to Elliott's inventive staging that shows us the world as Christopher experiences it. Uneventful occurrences for other people, like asking for directions or riding an escalator, are overwhelming to him unless he can imagine them as logical mathematical equations. Along with Christie's versatile set, the exceptional work by video designer Finn Ross, lighting designer Paul Constable, composer Adrian Sutton and choreographers Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett combine to create the confusing and intimidating sights and sounds Christopher encounters, as well as graphics that explain the equations behind his efforts to make sense of them. If the text were as inventive and surprising as the production, Curious Incident would be an extraordinary evening, but even Elliot's cleverness feels strained when there is little empathy behind it.

Slam poet Saul Williams is a galvanizing presence in his Broadway debut, playing a central role that can be taken as the author's voice. As John, he opens the evening in a prison cell, soon to be released after six years. 'My Block' offers his view of the violent and oppressive world he's returning to ('Now shit's constantly hot on my block / It never fails to be gunshots / Can't explain a mother's pain when her son drops.') but John is determined to just get a job and stay out of trouble.

While there are no miracles of biblical proportions, Violet ends with emotional cleansing, self-realization and hopefulness...Sutton Foster is that rare above-the-title Broadway star who can match polished musical theatre craft with an approachable everywoman quality. As Violet, she mixes her character's devout trust in the Lord with a protective shell of distrust built from twelve years of blaming her dad for both her initial injury and how he handled its aftermath and from dealing with the repulsed and cruel treatment she's received from others for half her life. It was the best acting performance of her New York career...Violet is a small musical of big ideas. Its spectacle comes in its writing and in the opportunity for singing actors to play intriguing characters. This production is not to be missed.

But little of that matters once McDonald takes the stage. So immediately stunning is the accuracy of her replication of Holiday's timbre and inflections at that point of her life that many of Thursday night's audience responded with applause a mere eight bars into her opening performance of 'I Wonder Where Our Love Has Gone.' So galvanizing is McDonald's work that it wasn't until midway through the performance that I began to notice images being projected in back of her. Never mind them. You won't want to draw your attention away from Audra McDonald for a moment. As the saying goes, there's a lady on stage, and not only is she an entrancing singer, but she's one hell of an actor.

But little of that matters once McDonald takes the stage. So immediately stunning is the accuracy of her replication of Holiday's timbre and inflections at that point of her life that many of Thursday night's audience responded with applause a mere eight bars into her opening performance of 'I Wonder Where Our Love Has Gone.' So galvanizing is McDonald's work that it wasn't until midway through the performance that I began to notice images being projected in back of her. Never mind them. You won't want to draw your attention away from Audra McDonald for a moment. As the saying goes, there's a lady on stage, and not only is she an entrancing singer, but she's one hell of an actor.

A little bit U.S. Senate and a little bit New York Philharmonic, designer Christopher Acebo's spacious set, given location specificity through a parade of scenes byShawn Sagady's projections, help the free-flowing pageantry of Robert Schenkkan's exciting and energetic drama, All The Way, gallop full speed in director Bill Rauch's pulse-racing production. At the center of a top-notch ensemble isBryan Cranston, portraying our 36th president with that memorable thick Texas drawl, a commanding presence, a quick mind and a ferocious temper. He is indeed a skilled conductor; ruthlessly political, bullying, foul-mouthed and often insensitive to those who show him the most loyalty, all for the cause of promoting the sweet harmony of civil rights with a minimal amount of rioting.

..Machinal, now revived in its original form in a striking production directed by Lyndsey Turner, chugs to the furious pace of its own rhythms in telling an expressionistic tale of a woman unable to keep up with the full-speed machinations of male-dominated 20th Century life; an ordinary woman driven to an extraordinary deed by a taste of what life can offer when she allows herself the freedom to live as she pleases. Unnamed and stripped of any biographical details, the central character of the drama is played with chillingly pale, tense timidity by Rebecca Hall.

Unfortunately, Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann are the secondary couple in Beautiful, a musical biography of Carole King that frequently pushes its central character aside for more interesting and entertaining moments played out by its skilled and talented supporting ensemble. It's no fault of top-billed star Jessie Mueller, who grabbed Broadway's attention for her jazzy stylings in On A Clear Day You Can See Forever and displayed crack comical chops in The Mystery of Edmund Drood, that her first original starring vehicle downplays her talents until the last half-hour or so of the evening, as she plays a young Brooklyn girl with ambition who grows into a woman who seems content to stay in the background and live an ordinary suburban married life until circumstances force her to find her own voice....Beautiful's central plot is more of a soapy, shorthand connect-the-dots between hit songs....By the time Mueller is allowed to vocally let loose on 'A Natural Woman' and wrap up the evening by wrapping her heart around the title tune, the genial inoffensiveness of the musical's creaky dramatics has denied her any chance of truly connecting the emotions of the songs to the character she's been playing all night, reducing the moments to merely chances to admire the artistry of a rising Broadway star being granted center stage. And for many, that'll be enough to make Beautiful a swell night out.

Unfortunately, Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann are the secondary couple in Beautiful, a musical biography of Carole King that frequently pushes its central character aside for more interesting and entertaining moments played out by its skilled and talented supporting ensemble. It's no fault of top-billed star Jessie Mueller, who grabbed Broadway's attention for her jazzy stylings in On A Clear Day You Can See Forever and displayed crack comical chops in The Mystery of Edmund Drood, that her first original starring vehicle downplays her talents until the last half-hour or so of the evening, as she plays a young Brooklyn girl with ambition who grows into a woman who seems content to stay in the background and live an ordinary suburban married life until circumstances force her to find her own voice....Beautiful's central plot is more of a soapy, shorthand connect-the-dots between hit songs....By the time Mueller is allowed to vocally let loose on 'A Natural Woman' and wrap up the evening by wrapping her heart around the title tune, the genial inoffensiveness of the musical's creaky dramatics has denied her any chance of truly connecting the emotions of the songs to the character she's been playing all night, reducing the moments to merely chances to admire the artistry of a rising Broadway star being granted center stage. And for many, that'll be enough to make Beautiful a swell night out.

Unfortunately, Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann are the secondary couple in Beautiful, a musical biography of Carole King that frequently pushes its central character aside for more interesting and entertaining moments played out by its skilled and talented supporting ensemble. It's no fault of top-billed star Jessie Mueller, who grabbed Broadway's attention for her jazzy stylings in On A Clear Day You Can See Forever and displayed crack comical chops in The Mystery of Edmund Drood, that her first original starring vehicle downplays her talents until the last half-hour or so of the evening, as she plays a young Brooklyn girl with ambition who grows into a woman who seems content to stay in the background and live an ordinary suburban married life until circumstances force her to find her own voice....Beautiful's central plot is more of a soapy, shorthand connect-the-dots between hit songs....By the time Mueller is allowed to vocally let loose on 'A Natural Woman' and wrap up the evening by wrapping her heart around the title tune, the genial inoffensiveness of the musical's creaky dramatics has denied her any chance of truly connecting the emotions of the songs to the character she's been playing all night, reducing the moments to merely chances to admire the artistry of a rising Broadway star being granted center stage. And for many, that'll be enough to make Beautiful a swell night out.

Unfortunately, Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann are the secondary couple in Beautiful, a musical biography of Carole King that frequently pushes its central character aside for more interesting and entertaining moments played out by its skilled and talented supporting ensemble. It's no fault of top-billed star Jessie Mueller, who grabbed Broadway's attention for her jazzy stylings in On A Clear Day You Can See Forever and displayed crack comical chops in The Mystery of Edmund Drood, that her first original starring vehicle downplays her talents until the last half-hour or so of the evening, as she plays a young Brooklyn girl with ambition who grows into a woman who seems content to stay in the background and live an ordinary suburban married life until circumstances force her to find her own voice....Beautiful's central plot is more of a soapy, shorthand connect-the-dots between hit songs....By the time Mueller is allowed to vocally let loose on 'A Natural Woman' and wrap up the evening by wrapping her heart around the title tune, the genial inoffensiveness of the musical's creaky dramatics has denied her any chance of truly connecting the emotions of the songs to the character she's been playing all night, reducing the moments to merely chances to admire the artistry of a rising Broadway star being granted center stage. And for many, that'll be enough to make Beautiful a swell night out.

Director Sean Mathias and his talented quartet of actors (they are billed above the title alphabetically as Billy Crudup, Shuler Hensley, Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart) do lovely service to both of them. No big bangs and whistles at the Cort Theatre; just a solidly acted pair of straightforward mountings that, despite all the attention paid to the two more famously named stage artists, serve the playwrights very well.