Shows You Should Already Have Tickets For, Fall 2017

By Ross

Last year, I wrote a blog about the 15 Shows that I was most excited for in the upcoming fall segment of the theatrical season, and it was such a hit with you readers that I thought I’d try it out again.  It feels like a very different kind of fall for me, but in some ways similar. There are a number of BIG shows coming in the spring, and I’ll list them below in the ‘Spring 2018: 10 Shows to Watch Out for’ section, but they aren’t included in the top 15.  It’s obvious that Harry Potter, Frozen, Angels in America, and The Iceman Cometh will be huge ticket sellers, right up there with Hello, Dolly! from last spring. But what will be this fall’s over-hyped and under-whelming The Front Page? or my most loved but slightly ignored Mary Louise Parker vehicle, Heisenberg?  or the star-studded classic but too-quickly gone Othello (I was hoping for a Broadway transfer)? The Band’s Visit is magnificent, but I doubt it will be this season’s Dear Evan Hansen, the Off-Broadway to Broadway transfer hit. So here’s my list of ‘must haves’ and ‘gotta gets’. Some on the list won’t be fast sellers but some are already on their way to being sold out. Be warned.

But first, the following show is not included in my list.  It will be a huge sell out I’m sure, and it will be electrifying on stage, but it’s not ‘theatre’ theatre in my books. But it is an event worth noting. So I hope you already have your code (whatever that means, I’m not in the loop on this one) cause the tickets will go fast:

SPRINGSTEEN ON BROADWAY
• Theatre: Walter Kerr
• First Preview: October 3, 2017
• Opening: October 12, 2017
• After a career of more than 40 years, 20 Grammys and an Oscar, legendary musician Bruce Springsteen comes to Broadway with a solo acoustic performance. It is an intimate night with Bruce, his guitar, a piano, and his stories.

My Top 15 Shows that I’m Most Excited About:

Here’s my list.  It’s order is based on my excitement levels, but if I made this list on a different day when I’m in a different mood, the placements might alter here or there, especially once you start getting near the bottom.  Here’s my 15 theatrical shows that I’m hoping I won’t miss (with an extra 5 that I’m keeping my eyes on, plus one bonus dance show that caught my eye), and neither should you:
Torch Song @2ST_NYC
1/Torch Song
• Theatre: Second Stage
• First Preview: Sept 26th
• Opening: Oct 19th
• Playwright: Harvey Fierstein
• Director: Moisés Kaufman
• Cast Includes: Jack DiFalco, Ward Horton, Roxnna Hope Radja, Michael Rosen, Mercedes Ruehl, & Michael Urie.
• It’s 1979 in NYC and Arnold is on a quest for love, purpose and family.  He’s fierce in drag and fearless in crisis, and he won’t stop until he achieves the life he desires.

Ross says: I never saw this play on stage, so that’s one of the reasons I’m thrilled by the idea of seeing it now. The tales from those you had seen it sound epic to me. The performances have stayed with them all these years. Fierstein’s work is always so relevant and connective, but the main draw is Urie. Ever since seeing him first in Buyer and Cellar, and lastly in The Government Inspector, (he also directed a witty fun Bright Colors, Bold Patterns) I’ve become a bigger and bigger fan. He’s matured into quite the leading man and actor before my theatrical eyes, so I’m most excited to see what he’ll do here with this mature and smart piece of playwriting.

2/ M. Butterfly
• Theatre: Cort Theatre
• First Previews: October 7, 2017
• Opening: October 26, 2017
• Playwright: David Henry Hwang
• Director: Julie Taymor
• Cast Includes: Clive Owen
• Revival of the Tony-winning 1988 drama about a French diplomat who carries on an affair with a beautiful Chinese opera singer who he believes to be a woman, but who turns out to be a man.

Ross says: The main draw here is Julie Taymor (The Lion King, Spiderman), with a dash of the excellent Clive Owen, who was so breath-taking in Roundabout’s Old Times. I’m very curious what Taymor will achieve with Hwang’s stellar play, one that I don’t know at all. Her style created one of the most beautiful A Midsummer Night’s Dream at TFANA that I have ever witnessed. So what will she do with this play and the wonderful Owen is anyone’s guess, but I want to be there to see it.

3/ The Band’s Visit
• Theatre: Ethel Barrymore
• First Preview: October 7, 2017
• Opening: November 9, 2017
• Music and Lyrics by David Yazbek
• Director: David Cromer
• Cast: Katrina Lenk, Tony Shalhoub, Ari’El Stachel
• The acclaimed Off-Broadway musical comes to Broadway, telling the story of an Egyptian police band that arrives in Israel to play a concert. When a mix-up at the border leaves them stranded with no bus or hotel in sight, these unlikely travelers must seek the help of the locals.

Ross says: I’ve seen this show when it played last fall at the Atlantic, and it was glorious. (Click here for the review) Cromer has managed to hold onto this beautifully balance cast, especially the magnificent Katrina Lenk who was both absolutely fierce and fantastic in this, and in her breathtaking turn in Indecent. Tony Shalhoub and the silky smooth Ari’El Stachel are also just the right amount of strong and sweet spice to create something truly special. I’m not sure it will be the financial hit that last year’s off Broadway darling, Dear Evan Hanson continues to be, but I’m hoping it is embraced as whole heartedly as it deserves.

4/ Meteor Shower
• Theatre: Booth Theatre
• First Preview: November 1, 2017
• Opening: November 29, 2017
• Written by Steve Martin
• Directed by Jerry Zaks
• Cast includes: Amy Schumer, Keegan-Michael Key, Laura Benanti, Alan Tudyk
• Two couples find themselves in marital freefall—and in a meteor shower—during one hot Ojai night.

Ross says: It’s really just about Steve Martin’s writing, and Laura Benanti (She Loves Me, Gypsy) doing just about anything, that will bring me to the Booth Theatre. I’m curious about Schumer, but just mildly. The real excitement is with those other two.

5/ Farinelli and the King
• Theatre: Belasco
• First Preview: December 5, 2017
• Opening: December 17, 2017
• Playwright/Director: Claire van Kampen
• Cast: Mark Rylance
• Spain’s 18th-century King Philip V is lifted out of depression by the singing of operatic castrato Farinelli. Previously presented in London at Shakespeare’s Globe and in the West End.

Ross says: For some reason, my buddy and I were unable to see this production in the West End last summer. Had it just closed, or was just about to open, or was it simply sold out? I’m not sure but I remember being disappointed to miss Rylance on stage. Because, to be honest, I’d go see anything he invests his time and talent in to. And I think I’ve seen all of his latest NYC stage appearances; Nice Fish, Boeing Boeing, Jerusalem, Twelfth Night, and Richard III, so why would I want to stop here, especially when the play sounds so interesting.

6/ A Clockwork Orange
• Theatre: New World Stages
• First Preview: September 2, 2017
• Opening: September 25, 2017
• Playwright: Based on book by Anthony Burgess
• Director: Alexandra Spencer-Jones
• Cast: Jonno Davies, Matt Doyle, Sean Patrick Higgins, Brian Lee Huynh, Timothy Sekk, Aleksander Varadian, Ashley Robinson, Jimmy Brooks, Misha Osherovich, and Jordan Bondurant.

Ross says: The story is brutal at times, a haunting ground-breaking classic that revels in the darkest parts of  the human condition. Anthony Burgess’ book, published in 1962 is unapologetically brutal while simultaneously being considered one the greatest novels of all time by both Time Magazine and The Guardian.  The movie is not one that inspires (me at least) to watch numerous times, but it is a cult hit. The stage adaptation, widely praised before transferring off-broadway from London, places itself firmly in between 1984, currently thrilling crowds on Broadway, and the musical American Psycho which crashed and burned quite quickly after opening in April 2016. I’m curious what this British transfer will come up with to tell us this take of a perpetrator of ‘a little of the old ultra violence,’ who after behavior modification, returns to the same cruel world and becomes the victim.  I’m also intrigued by the cast of handsome young actors, lead by the stunning Jonno Davies (Film: ‘Kingsman: The Secret Service’). Sounds like bloody good fun, right?

7/ People, Places, & Things
• Theatre: St, Ann’s Warehouse
• First Preview: October 19th
• Opening: ?
• Playwright: Duncan MacMillan
• Director: Jeremy Herrin
• Cast Includes: Denise Gough (NT’s Angels in America)
• A raw, heartbreaking and truthful performance about life spinning recklessly out of control.

Ross says: Gough was the standout for me when I saw the NTLive’s screening of the National Theatre’s production of Angels in America, which she will once again take on the role of Harper, made famous by Mary Louise Parker (HBO) and Marcia Gay Harden (Broadway) in the Spring on Broadway. Until that time, we are blessed with the first collaboration between St. Ann’s Warehouse and the National Theatre. People, Places, and Things won Gough the Olivier earlier this year when it premiered at the National and in London’s West End. I missed it when I was in England last summer. Add these things up, and you can completely understand why I must see this play when it comes to Brooklyn for a very short limited run. You should too.

8/ When Pigs Fly
• Theatre: Stage 42
• First Preview: October 6th
• Opening: October 30th
• Playwright: conceived by Howard Crabtree & Mark Waldrop; Book & Lyrics by Mark Waldrop, Music by Dick Gallagher
• Director: Mark Waldrop; Costumes by Bob Mackie
• Cast Includes: Jordan Ahnquist, Taylor Crousore, Jacob Hoffman, Brian Charles Rooney, Frank Viveros, Cameron Mitchell Bell, Paul Sabala
• When Howard, a mad genius costume designer with Ziegfeld-sized ambitions, flunks his high school vocational test, he puts everything he has into his one true dream: putting on a show!

Ross says: Winning numerous Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, and OBIE awards when it first was staged at the Douglas Fairbanks Theatre running for 840 performances with an opening in August, 1996, When Pigs Fly is back on stage, and just sounds like a whole lot of campy fun. With new songs by Waldrop and Gallagher, and costumes by nine-time Emmy winning design legend, Bob Mackey, one can’t miss something that sounds this delicious.

9/ Pride and Prejudice
• Theatre: Primary Stages at Cherry Lane
• First Preview: November 7th
• Opening: November 18th?
• Written by and featuring Kate Hamill, adapted from the novel by Jane Austen
• Director: Amanda Dehnert
• Cast Includes: Kate Hamill, Mark Bedard, Kimberly Chatterjee, Jason O’Connell, Amelia Pedlow, Chris Thorn, John Tufts, Nance Williamson,
• The creator of Bedlam’s Sense and Sensibility and Pearl Theatre Company’s Vanity Fair will debut her playful new adaptation of Jane Austen’s classic romance.

Ross says: I loved the smart, inventive, and witty take on Vanity Fair that Hamill created, and I was kicking myself that I never made it in to see her Sense and Sensibility, so I won’t be foolish once again and miss this Auston adaptation. Will the magic of these remakes keep giving us gold? I definitely think so.

10/ Junk
• Theatre: Vivian Beaumont
• First Preview: October 5, 2017
• Opening: November 2, 2017
• Playwright: Ayad Akhtar
• Director: Doug Hughes
• Cast Includes: Steven Pasquale
• New drama about a self-professed investment genius who touches off a financial civil war.

Ross says: A play being described as a modern morality tale that tries to prove that  all motivation based on making money be labeled as ‘right’, sounds like it could be intense, especially when helmed by Hughes (MTC’s The Father, MCC’s Frozen), starring the incredible Steven Pasquale (Far From Heaven, The Robber Bridegroom) and written by the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright of Disgraced, Ayad Akhtar. Looks like all the ingredients of a powerful and fulfilling night at the theatre. I’m in to Junk.

11/ Tiny Beautiful Things
• The Public Theater/Newman Theater
• First Preview: September 19, 2017
• Opening: October 2nd, 2018
• Playwright: Nia Vardalos
• Directed by Thomas Kail
• Cast: Nia Vardalos, Teddy Cañez, Ceci Fernandez, DeLance Minefee, Hubert Point-Du Jour, Natalie Woolams-Torres
• Following its critically-aclaimed and sold-out run last season, the play, based on the best-selling book by author Cheryl Strayed, returns to the Public Theater’s Newman Theater.

Ross says: This is a beautiful piece of emotional theater that hits you with startling wave after wave of deep connection and empathy. I saw Tiny Beautiful Things last year, and I’m thrilled that it has returned for another round of letter readings. Go see it for yourself if you missed it last year, or just go see it again, and get ready for the waves.

12/ Bedlam’s Peter Pan
• Theatre: Manhattan Theatre Club – Stage I
• First Preview: November 11th
• Opening: November 19th
• Playwright: J.M. Barrie
• Director: Eric Tucker
• Cast: Eric Tucker, Kelley Curran, Brad Heberlee, Edmund Lewis, Susannah Millonzi, Zuzanna Szadkowski,
• Bedlam returs to Off-Broadway with a new production of this classic tale of Neverland, just in time for the Holidays.

Ross says: This just sounds fun. A classic tale told by an inventive theater company who always surprises. I hope I find myself there surrounded by (well-behaved) kids and watch their eyes grow wide with surprise and emotion. Yes, I’m thinking of that scene from the movie, ‘Finding Neverland’, about J. M. Barrie and the first staging of Peter Pan. And I’m hoping it is just as awe-inspiring.

13/ The Portuguese Kid
• Manhattan Theatre Club – Stage I
• First Preview: September 19, 2017
• Opening: October 24, 2017
• Playwright: John Patrick Shanley
• Director: John Patrick Shanley
• Cast: Jason Alexander, Pico Alexander, Sherie Rene Scott, and Mary Testa.
• In Rhode Island, habitually widowed Atalanta pays a visit to her second-rate lawyer in arider to settle her latest husband’s affairs, which quickly become a nightmare of comic combustion.

Ross says: The only things drawing me to this production are the two three-named persons of superior talent: John Patrick Shanley (Doubt: A Parable, ‘Moonstruck’) and Sherie Rene Scott (Whorl Inside A Loop, Everyday Rapture). Their names are long in order to encompass all that talent.

14/ The Parisian Woman
• Theatre: Hudson Theatre
• First Preview: November 7, 2017
• Opening: November 30, 2017
• Written by Beau Willimon
• Directed by Pam MacKinnon
• Cast includes: Uma Thurman, Josh Lucas, Blair Brown, Phillipa Soo
• in Washington, D.C., powerful friends are the only kind worth having. At the center is Chloe, a socialite armed with charm and wit, coming to terms with politics, her past, her marriage and an uncertain future.

Ross says: Will Uma be amazing? I’m not sure I’m all that curious, to be honest, but I do adore Josh Lucas (‘Sweet Home Alabama‘), Phillipa Soo (Hamilton, Amélie), and worship Blair Brown (Arcadia, Copenhagen, On the Shore of the Wide World).  These are the main star driven reasons this play has made it on to my list. The play, written by the Academy Award (‘The Ides of March‘) and Emmy Award (“House of Cards“) playwright, Willimon adds to that intrigue.

15/ Brigadoon
• Theatre: New York City Center (MainStage) Gala
• First Preview: November 15th
• Opening: November 15th
• Book & Lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner, Music by Frederick Loewe
• Director/Choreographer:  Christopher Wheeldon
• Cast includes: Stephanie J. Block, Sara Esty, Robert Fairchild, Ross Lekites, Aasif Mandvi, Kelli O’Hara, & Patrick Wilson.
• Tommy and his friend jeff are jaded new Yorkers who stumble into an idyllic Scottish town that appears for only one day every century.

Ross says: I don’t know this show. At. All. And I feel I should. I’ve been told it’s a bit long and dull, but with a cast that includes Stephanie J. Block (Falsettos), Robert Fairchild (American in Paris), Kelly O’Hara (The King and I) and the dreamy Patrick Wilson (Oklahoma!, HBO’s ‘Angels in America‘), how could that possibly be true?

15B/ The Red Shoes
• Theatre: New York City Center (MainStage)
• First Preview: October 26th
• Opening:
• Music by Bernard Herrmann
• Director/Choreographer:  Matthew Bourne
• The beloved story of obsession, possession, and one girl’s dream to be the greatest dancer in the world.

Ross says: I’m just throwing this in as a bit of an add-on.  I don’t think of it as a theatrical event, but more of a ballet production.  That being said, I tend to stay away from straight on ballet, but it’s Matthew Bourne (1999 Tony Award winner for the all male Swan Lake) and he’s always up to something interesting.  And The Red Shoes is a legendary story, that I do not know, so I’m hoping I get the opportunity to see it, and write about the experience.

An Additional 5 shows that I’m keeping my eyes on:

16/ Once On This Island
• Theatre: Circle in the Square
• First Preview: November 9, 2017
• Opening: December 3, 2017
• Music and Lyrics by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty
• Director: Michael Arden
• A revival of the 1990 musical about a a peasant girl and her star-crossed romance with a young man from the wealthy side of her Caribbean island, which is ruled by four island gods.

Ross says: I think Lea Salonga who stars has a stunning voice. She was so wonderful in Broadway’s 2015 musical, Allegiance, and this show, directed by Arden who gave us the lovely revival of Deaf West Theatre’s Spring Awakening a few years back, definitely deserves attention paid.

17/ The Wolves
• Theatre: Lincoln Center’s Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater
• First Preview: November 1st
• Opening: November 20th
• Playwright: Sarah DeLappe
• Director: Lila Neugebauer
• Transferring to the Lincoln Center, this Pulitzer Prize nominee is a fly-on-the-wall look at a girl’s high school soccer team as they go through their warm-ups.

Ross says: I’d love to see this precise and thoughtful look into the lives and experiences of these young women once again. I can’t picture it anywhere else but the soccer stadium style theatre when it played (and won numerous awards) at the Duke on 42nd St., but I’m sure Playwrights Realm will not let us down. They didn’t with this and their current show, The Rape of the Sabine Women by Grace B. Matthias, so I’m not worried, just excited.

18/ Spongebob Squarepants
• Theatre: Palace
• First Preview: November 6, 2017
• Opening: December 4, 2017
• Book by Kyle Jarrow, music by Steven Tyler, Cyndi Lauper, They Might Be Giants, Jonathan Coulton, Dirty Projectors, The Flaming Lips, Sara Bareilles, John Legend, Lady Antebellum, Panic! At the Disco, Plain White T’s, T.I. and David Bowie.
• Director: Tina Landau
• Stage adaptation of the hit Nickelodeon cartoon series about the undersea residents of Bikini Bottom. The show had a Chicago tryout in summer 2016.

Ross says: Don’t ask me why I’m excited. Maybe because it just sounds so ridiculous that it might surprise us all and be fantastic. Here’s hoping the humor works on a few different levels and age groups.

19/ Time and the Conways
• Theatre: American Airlines
• First Preview: September 14, 2017
• Opening: October 10, 2017
• Playwright: J.B. Priestley
• Director: Rebecca Taichman
• Cast Includes: Elizabeth McGovern, Anna Camp, Gabriel Ebert, Steven Boyer
• Roundabout Theatre Company revival of this drama showing the status and dreams of British family just after World War I, and then as those dreams play out 19 years later.

Ross says: I’m mainly going because of director Rebecca Taichman who floored me with her Tony Award winning direction of Indecent. But one also has to be excited to see Downton Abbey‘s Cora Crawley, Elizabeth McGovern, and Hand to God‘s Steven Boyer in the same play.

20/ On the Shore of the Wide World
• Atlantic Theatre Company/Linda Gross Theater
• First Preview: August 23, 2017
• Opening: September 12
• Playwright: Simon Stephens
• Director: Neil Pepe
• Cast: Blair Brown, Odiseas Georgiadis, Peter Maloney, Mary McCann, LeRoy McClain, Tedra Millan, Ben Rosenfield, Luke Slattery, C.J. Wilson, and Amelia Workman.
• In Simon Stephen’s play, set over the course of nine months, something is about to happen that will change one family forever.

Ross says: Well I just love a Simon Stephen’s play. I happily ran myself ragged trying to get from the airport to the Steep Theatre in Chicago in time for curtain to see 2016’s Wastwater.  He also wrote the most delicious Heisenberg, the wondrous new adaptation of the 3 Penny Opera at the National Theatre in London, and of course, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time which can’t be beat in its brilliant retelling of a very difficult book. His power lies in this intricate one-on-one dialogue, and I’m curious to discover what this play will offer. The buzz isn’t great, and I’m trying to stay away from the other reviews (it opened yesterday as I write this) before seeing it this weekend, so most likely my review will be posted around the same time as I post this.

Spring 2018: 10 Shows to Watch Out for:

 

So rev up your computers and get in line. Ready. Set…..

THREE TALL WOMEN
• Theatre: Golden Theatre
• First Preview: February 27, 2018
• Opening: March 29, 2018
• Written by Edward Albee
• Director: Joe Mantello
• Cast Includes: Laurie Metcalf, Glenda Jackson, Alison Pill
• Three women of different ages talk about their lives and their relationships with their families. Gradually it emerges that they may all be the same woman.

CAROUSEL
• Theatre: Imperial Theatre
• First Preview: February 28, 2018
• Opening: April 12, 2018
• Music and lyrics by Rodgers and Hammerstein
• Director: Jack O’Brien
• Cast Includes: Joshua Henry, Jessie Mueller, Renee Fleming
• Free-spirit carnival barker Billy Bigelow’s love for the curiously soulful Julie Jordan persists beyond the circles of time. Includes the songs “If I Loved You,” “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” “June Is Bustin’ Out All Over” and “Soliloquy (My Boy Bill).” Based on the drama Liliom by Ferenc Molnar.

Ross says: This is another classic musical that I do not know as a whole staged piece. So naturally I must go. And with a cast the included these magnificent creatures: Joshua Henry, Jessie Mueller, Renee Fleming, how could I miss it. 

 

MY FAIR LADY
• Theatre: Vivian Beaumont
• First Preview: March 15, 2018
• Opening: April 19, 2018
• Music by Frederick Loewe. Book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner.
• Director: Bartlett Sher
• Choreographer: Christopher Gattelli
• Cast: TBA
• Revival of the classic musical adaptation of Shaw’s Pygmalion

 Ross says: I’ve never seen this show on stage, although I have loved the movie and have fond loving memories of the original Broadway cast recording album. I can visualize it now, playing it over and over on my living room record player. I could have danced, danced, danced all night.   

THIS AIN’T NO DISCO
• Atlantic Theatre Company/Linda Gross Theater
• First Preview: May 11, 2018
• Opening: TBD
• Music and Lyrics: Stephen Trask and Peter Yanowitz
• Book: Rick Elice
• Director: Trip Cullman
• Set against the grit, the garbage strikes, the graffiti of 1979 New York City, This Ain’t No Disco tells the story of drifters and dreamers searching for their place in the night world of Studio 54 and Mudd Club. In their uptown/downtown quest for revelry and kinship, every decision is fateful in a city where one’s fate can turn on a dime bag.

Ross says: Great idea, and with Stephen Trask (Hedwig) attached, my curiosity is peaked. I hope I have better luck getting in to see this show, then when I was 16 years old trying to get into Studio 54. 

CARMEN JONES
• Theatre: Classic Stage Company
• First Preview: June 2018
• Opening: June 2018
• Book & Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, Music by Georges Bizet
• Director: John Doyle
• As the Second World War rages, parachute maker Carmen Jones wages her own quarrel involving an airman and a boxer.

Ross says: A John Doyle revival of a classic that I don’t know, well, that’s enough for me. 

ANGELS IN AMERICA
• Theatre: Neil Simon theatre
• First Preview: February 23, 2018
• Opening: March 21, 2018
• Playwright: Tony Kushner
• Director: Marianne Elliott
• Cast Includes: Nathan Lane, Andrew Garfield, Denise Gough, James McArdle, Susan Brown, Amanda Lawrence, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett
• Twenty five years after stunning the theatar world, one of the greatest theaterical journeys of our time returns to Broadway in an acclaimed new production from the National Theatre.

Ross says: I can’t tell you how much I want to see this revival. Oh wait, I sorta can, as I wrote quite the long piece about it over the summer when I saw the NYLive’s screening at BAM. So nuff said. Go. And breath in the wonder. 

THE ICEMAN COMETH
• Theatre: Bernard B. Jacobs
• First Preview: March 22, 2018
• Opening: April 26, 2018
• Written by Eugene O’Neill
• Director: George C. Wolfe
• Cast Includes: Denzel Washington
• Denzel Washington returns to Broadway in a revival of the classic O’Neill play.

Ross says: I know I should be more excited about this, but I can’t summon up the energy. Denzel just never captivated me. He “makes too many faces”.