Four musicals and a play that has a lot of original music in it, opened on Broadway this past week, and two plays opened Off Broadway. By the end of the day Thursday, which marks the official end of the Broadway season, SEVEN more Broadway shows will have opened.
The Week in New York Theater Reviews
Broadway openings, in order of my preference:
Suffs
“Suffs,” a show about the final seven-year push to win American women the right to vote, has been changed a lot since its Off-Broadway production two years ago. The show is more streamlined, more focused. At the same time, with the transfer to Broadway, my assessment has changed somewhat. “Suffs” on Broadway is likely to be sought out more for its inspiration and enlightenment than its entertainment.
Hell’s Kitchen
“Hell’s Kitchen,” a lively tuneful musicals, is not a musical biography of Alicia Keys, nor, despite the title, is it about the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood where she grew up. It’s really a jukebox musical, which is to say, an efficient delivery system for Alicia Keys’ songs –
Stereophonic
The play chronicles a year of recording studio sessions by the members of a popular 1970s rock band (never named, fictional) as they put together their latest album and have their ups and downs with one another. At more than three hours long (including intermission), “Stereophonic” feels as if it’s in Annie Baker territory – which is to say, long and slow but meticulously observed from real life, unfolding as if in real time, but also offering a subtle wit and the possibility of deeper meaning. But does that sound like the right approach for a play about ROCK N ROLL?!
Cabaret
This misguided production, in short, has gotten the balance wrong between unsettling and entertaining.
The Wiz
“The Wiz,” opening at Broadway’s Marquis Theater after an evidently exhausting seven months on the road, goes too far. There is no Toto! There are no “Munchkins” (they’re “townspeople” now.) We only see the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Lion when they’re in Oz, not their Kansas versions beforehand. And there is no Yellow Brick Road. These iconic elements are not, I suppose, strictly necessary — plenty of classic tales are “reimagined” for a new generation — but there is something more essential that’s missing from this reworked Wiz. They may still ease on down the (non yellow brick) road, but there’s little sense of ease.
What I mean is: The cast as a whole can sing to the rafters and dance like the dickens, but their belting started to feel like an American Idol competition, and some of the dance numbers seemed so frenzied that at times they gave off an aura of desperation.
Off Broadway:
Sally & Tom
Thomas Jefferson was in his forties when he began having sex with one of his slaves, Sally Hemings, who was 14.
Had they fallen in love? The question is absurd.
But did they eventually fall in love?
That’s one of the several intriguing questions that Suzan-Lori Parks explores in “Sally & Tom,” her play about a present-day theater troupe that is putting together an original play about Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, which they’ve entitled “The Pursuit of Happiness.” The play-within-the play is led by an interracial couple:…Full Review
Orlando
The stage adaptation by Sarah Ruhl of Virginia Woolf’s 1928 novel is now being revived at Signature Theater, in what feels like the exact right time by the exact right cast. But the production doesn’t wind up feeling exactly right.
The Week in New York Theater News
Kit Connor (“Heartstopper”) and Go Rachel Zegler (Spielberg’s West Side Story) will star in the new Broadway production of William Shakespeare’s ROMEO + JULIET,directed by Sam Gold, with music by Jack Antonoff and movement by Sonya Tayeh. Aiming for Fall 2024
Woodie King, Jr.’s New Federal Theatre has relocated and is now in residence at The WP (formerly Women’s Project) Theater, with performance space located at 2162 Broadway and administrative offices at 55 West End Ave.
Awards this week: Nominations for Drama League, Outer Critics Circle, and Chita Rivera.
See my 2024 New York Theater Awards calendar and guide.
In Memoriam
Carrie Robbins, 81, Broadway costume designer of such original Broadway productions as Grease, White Christmas, and Yentl
From my interview with her ten years ago for HowlRound:
Carrie Robbins designed the costumes for the first play that Meryl Streep performed on Broadway, for the original production of Grease, and for more than thirty other shows on Broadway. But there came a time, shortly after her husband died, when she felt costume designing just wasn’t enough.
“Sometimes,” she thought, “the most important decision I make as a costume designer is: ‘Should I make this out of silk charmeuse or should I make it out of silk crepe?’” Now she says, “I began to see that what my husband did was better than what I was working on.”
Her husband was a physician, then a writer. Carrie Robbins decided to adapt his short stories for the stage
