Thom Greier

Edwin Drood's chief claim to fame is Holmes' clever script, particularly his ingenious means of handling the fact that Dickens never wrote the material for the final act. So Holmes simply stops the show, mid-song, and throws crucial questions — including the identity of whodunit — to the audience to decide by democratic vote. As a result, the cast must prepare multiple versions of the ending, with different lyrics and lines dusted off depending on the outcome of the polling. And there's visible delight on stage when theatergoers make less conventional, Herman Cain-like choices. But as Rivera and her top-vote-getting love interest struggled to stay in character through their melodic seduction — clearly this was a new pairing for the cast — it struck me that the obvious joy of the performers on stage was not always translating across the proscenium. Suspiciously, I have to wonder if this is one entertainment that is just more fun to perform than to watch. B

Is Jim Parsons the next Jimmy Stewart? I wouldn't have made the connection before seeing the uneven new Broadway revival of Mary Chase's Harvey…But like Stewart, the two-time Emmy-winning star of The Big Bang Theory is a rail-thin everyman who projects both intelligence and fundamental decency. He's perfectly suited to reprise Stewart's role from the 1950 film version of Harvey…Alas, the same might be said of Scott Ellis' oddly sluggish production, which lurches from scene to scene when it should be bunny-hopping briskly along. Mary Chase's play too often feels like a dated relic, and much of the cast are ill-suited to its demands…The revelation here, aside from David Rockwell's stunning revolving sets, is Parsons.

Competently directed by Christopher Ashley with some lively choreography by Sergio Trujillo, the show occasionally grapples with an interesting question: Can a seriously flawed man still be a vessel for God's will, even for the miraculous? But while Esparza has a confident, commanding stage presence, he doesn't seem oily enough in his early scenes to make his second-act moment of reckoning pay off...The show does brush on a thin veneer of documentary-style exposé — we see how a sham healer gathers telling details about his congregation to exploit during his revival service — but otherwise the story never strays from its highly conventional path. And for Broadway veterans, that path should seem especially familiar. Leap of Faith is The Music Man meets 110 in the Shade, with an overly pat ending that undercut's the plot's refreshing ambivalence about the path to salvation.

While the mayhem in Don't Dress for Dinner never rises to the dizzying heights of Boeing-Boeing, there are plenty of gut-busting moments to savor. And just be glad you didn't have to taste Suzanne's combination of cheese soufflé and baked Alaska.

The chief draws of Warchus' production are the high-tech set (by designer Rob Howell), the cinematic video projections (designed by Jon Driscoll), the striking lighting (designed by Hugh Vanstone), and illusionist Paul Kieve's onstage magic effects that let Sam move objects and walk through walls. Like Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark, the musical version of Ghost haunts the eye, not the ear.

The play's twists, which include a then-scandalous gay rumor, may seem less surprising to audiences grown jaded by Fox News, MSNBC, and the 24/7 political spin cycle. But Vidal's play remains remarkably well-constructed (and the cast will doubtless improve the pacing, which moseys occasionally, as they grow into their roles). ... And there's 86-year-old Angela Lansbury, sharp as a tack even if she needs a cane now to command the stage, as the Southern grand dame who chairs the party's women's division and sways the crucial women's vote.

Assuming Bale's role as head newsie Jack Kelly on Broadway, Jeremy Jordan (survivor of the recent Bonnie & Clyde) proves he doesn't need anyone wandering into his sight lines to be an explosive presence on stage. Blessed with a crystalline voice, Jordan conveys a rare combination of masculine swagger and vulnerability. He gets a worthy foil and love interest in aspiring reporter Katherine (charming newcomer Kara Lindsay), one of several smart additions to the film's story by playwright Harvey Fierstein. She also lands one of Menken and lyricist Jack Feldman's best new songs, the delightful double-talking 'Watch What Happens.'

Compliments must be paid. Director Mike Nichols' stirring Death of a Salesman, running on Broadway through June 2, harbors no radical agenda, no modern glosses or reinterpretations of Arthur Miller's text. Instead, Nichols & Co. play it straight. And rarely has a classic work seemed straighter, or truer.

In the end, though, this is an approachable and heartfelt version of Porgy and Bess that showcases George Gershwin's glorious melodies and the bottomless talents of McDonald. Her Bess is a complex, three-dimensional figure both classic and contemporary, the stuff of Greek tragedy and of countless Lifetime movies. She's a scarred woman who defines herself by the men in her life — men who are too often abusive bullies. And when she encounters a big-hearted man worthy of her affections, she has too little self-esteem to assert her heart's truest desires or think herself worthy of her good fortune. And as played by McDonald with the full force of her vocal and acting abilities, Bess becomes an unforgettable and iconic American character. Bess, you is all of our woman now.

The show has its charms, particularly Lewis Flynn's surprisingly hook-filled score, the reliably hilarious one-liners by book writer Douglas Carter Beane, and some fine comic performances. But too much of the time, it plays like a slightly raunchier version of a Nickelodeon or Disney Channel sitcom, rife with predictable plotlines and broad cultural and racial stereotypes.

It must have been an overcast day when the team behind On a Clear Day You Can See Forever decided to revive this short-lived 1965 musical. Granted, the score boasts some delightful melodies, including the title track, by composer Burton Lane and lyricist Alan Jay Lerner. But Lerner's original book was widely dismissed as a mess involving a woman with ESP, reincarnation, and a hypnosis-practicing shrink who falls for his patient's past life.

In the end, Stick Fly sometimes seems as insecure as some of its characters about its place in the world. It hints at a family drama worthy of August Wilson or Lorraine Hansberry, with flashes of insight into the contemporary African American experience. But too often it settles for raised voices and shocking twists — and the gasps and clucks that they'll elicit from the audience. There's a skill to crafting such entertainments, to be sure, but Diamond has the potential to write plays that do much, much more.

Ivan Menchell's script mostly propels the story forward while never managing to establish why this outlaw duo so seized the public imagination. We see bank patrons ask for Bonnie's autograph during a holdup, for instance, but we never really grasp why — especially since the scene ends with Clyde gunning down the teller. And there's no good explanation for why Clyde's deeply religious sister-in-law (Melissa Van der Schyff, who has a lovely second-act ballad, 'That's What You Call a Dream') joins her husband on the lam. The production's biggest success may be Aaron Rhyne's projections, which include vintage photos of the real-life models for the characters on stage — including their mug shots. It makes you wonder what another team might have made of this promising material. Wildhorn's Bonnie & Clyde aims for kiss-kiss-bang-bang, but too often it's just firing blanks. C

There are movie stars, and there are all-around entertainers. On the evidence of Hugh Jackman, Back on Broadway, a Vegas-style one-man show, Hugh Jackman is definitely the latter. Not since Liza Minnelli's Liza's at the Palace nearly three years ago have we seen such command of the stage and repertoire by a solo artist. The comparison seems fitting since Jackman's first appearance on the New York stage was his Tony-winning turn as Minnelli's late husband, the gay Australian singer-songwriter Peter Allen, in 2003's The Boy From Oz.

Theater-goers may experience similar feelings of submission, happily under the spell of Arianda's mesmerizing performance. A-

The Wymans emerge as an all-American family, acting out against each other out of both love and self-interest. And the show's second-act fireworks seem like a fittingly all-American way to celebrate the arrival of a major new play.