Turns out, he’s bringing to theatergoers one of the best new plays to open this year. Preston Max Allen’s “Caroline” had its world premiere Monday at the MCC Theater and we know we’re in a  fine storyteller’s hands as soon as a mother, Maddie (Chloë Grace Moretz), and her very young child (River Lipe-Smith) sit down in a greasy spoon for a breakfast of french toast and mac ‘n’ cheese. There’s the child’s broken arm, the mother’s request for a bag of ice and the two suitcases, all of which come into stark focus the moment the two of them discuss what the kid’s name will be. Clearly, as the cover of the Playbill tells us, the name chosen is Caroline.

This mother-child team brings to mind a similar family of two, in Martin Scorsese’s “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” where Monterey, California, emerges as the dream destination. Maddie and Caroline have a far greater need to dream of a better place to live since they’re presently stuck in West Virginia. They’re soon on the road to see Maddie’s mother (Amy Landecker), and her home in Evanston, Illinois, looms as a safe legal haven for Caroline.

But is it?

Allen’s play could well be a screenplay, and the set design by Lee Jellinek provides the restaurant, two very different bedrooms, an upscale kitchen and a comfy living room for the characters to move across. The nicer environs belong to Maddie’s own mother, who hasn’t seen her daughter for a few years even though Maddie is now only 25 years old. It is not a happy homecoming, and Landecker is superb at making us feel everything that went down a decade ago between this daughter and mother. With a lesser actor, Maddie’s mother could come off as a stereotypical villain. The character’s judgment of her daughter and grandchild provoked audible gasps of outrage from the MCC audience. Landecker’s nuanced performance, however, actually makes a valid case for this character’s apparent rigidity. We should not forget that grandmother and Caroline are meeting for the first time, and the granddaughter sports an injured arm.

Moretz has the far showier role. Unlike Landecker, she’s given big emotional scenes that show off her acting chops, which are considerable. But most remarkable is a scene late in the play where Moretz must submerge all those feelings to explain calmly a most difficult decision to Caroline.

Which brings this review to River Lipe-Smith. If I’ve ever seen a more accomplished performance from a  child actor on stage, I can’t think of it. Over and over again, this young actor delivers a zinger with the comic timing of a veteran stand-up comic. It’s one of the great things about Allen’s writing and Cromer’s direction: They know how to win an audience’s sympathy not through tears but laughter.

The post ‘Caroline’ Off Broadway Review: Chloë Grace Moretz Delivers as a Single Mom in Crisis appeared first on TheWrap.

“Oh, what a beautiful mornin’! We’re coming to Broadway April 2026 for a limited engagement,” the musical announced on Tuesday. “Your one-way tickets are waiting.”

“Schmigadoon!” on Broadway has set its opening night for April 20 at the Nederlander Theatre and will run through Sept. 6 next year.

“Saturday Night Live” icon Lorne Michaels produces based on the Universal Television and Apple TV+ series, with a score by Cinco Paul. Micah Frank, Caroline Maroney, Christine Schwarzman and Megan O’Keefe also produce through Broadway Video and No Guarantees Productions.

“’Schmigadoon!’ is a love letter to the Golden Age of movie musicals,” Michaels said in a Tuesday statement. “It’s a little bit nostalgic and a lot of fun. We’re very excited to bring it to Broadway.”

“New York doctors Josh and Melissa set out on a couples’ backpacking retreat to rekindle the flame, but instead find themselves in Schmigadoon, a magical town that’s a Golden Age musical come to life. The townspeople won’t stop singing, the bridge out leads nowhere, and the only way to escape is by finding true love—which may or may not be with each other,” per the logline.

Keegan-Michael Key, Cecily Strong, Dove Cameron, Jaime Camil, Kristin Chenoweth, Ariana DeBose, Jane Krakowski, Aaron Tveit and Alan Cumming starred in two seasons of the Apple TV+ musical comedy from 2021-2023.

The post ‘Schmigadoon!’ Sets Limited Broadway Run for April 2026 From Producer Lorne Michaels appeared first on TheWrap.

In “Punch,” it’s not really a therapy session so much as it is a “restorative justice” meeting between two parents, (Victoria Clark and Sam Robards), and the young man (Will Harrison) who killed their son with just one lethal blow during a pub brawl. The 19-year-old is named Jacob because he is the author, Jacob Dunne, who was convicted of manslaughter for killing Joan and David’s son James Hodgkinson and went on to write “Right From Wrong” and co-founded the Common Ground Justice Project — of which Joan and David are advisors.

To criticize a play that tells this story of transformation is to be a grump. But good intentions aren’t enough to make a good play. The suspense leading up to the first meeting between the parents and Jacob is palpable, and in those early moments, it’s clear that there’s a lot of pent-up emotions ready to erupt at the mere choice of a wrong word, much less a whole question or pointed accusation. Obviously, the three of them eventually come to more than an understanding; they become good friends and Jacob goes on to have a beautiful wife, an adorable baby and a successful career. So where’s his Nobel Prize? And more important, where’s the drama after two hours and 20 minutes? The resolution here is much too easy and pat. Maybe that’s the way it transpired in real life, but the stage is another world.

Yes, it feels good to know that, occasionally, convicts like Jacob can turn their life around and go on to do good. And even more heartwarming, before he delivered the lethal punch, Jacob had all sorts of other formidable odds to overcome, stuff like dyslexia and autism, not to mention an economically disadvantaged childhood. We learn all these things because Will Harrison tells us every unfortunate feature of Jacob’s life. It is a narrative that’s not so much dramatized as it is told. Actually, it’s shouted at us by Harrison, who is an actor of not much nuance.

His loud performance is of a piece with Adam Penford’s splashy direction, which punctuates every other sentence coming from Harrison’s mouth with lots of lighting (by Robbie Butler) and sound effects (by Alexandra Faye Braithwaite).

There’s something else that Penford does that’s really grating. Even though he has 10 actors on stage, he relies on leads Clark and Robards to play minor characters with a mere switch of a hairdo or a shirt. It’s especially unfortunate to see Clark, a fine actor, resort to cheap tricks to go from playing the levelheaded mom to the cute grandma to some rowdy young street urchin.

As a playwright, Graham is as unsubtle here as he was with his previous ripped-from-the-headlines Broadway offering, “Ink,” about Rupert Murdoch. In one “Punch” scene, he has the owner of some Amazon-like warehouse, where Jacob briefly works on his way to rehabilitation, lecture us about an economy that has gone from producing things to simply shipping things. It’s a five-minute speech that I’ve heard at least once a week on MSNBC and delivered to better effect. To make it even more insufferable, Piter Marek delivers this New Finance 101 talk in the same hectoring manner that Harrison uses. And, of course, in another of Penford’s quick character switcheroos, Marek throws off his sports jacket to play a street thug in the very next scene.

Awkward, yes; impressive, no.

The post ‘Punch’ Broadway Review: A True Story of Manslaughter Makes a Mawkish Transfer to the Stage appeared first on TheWrap.

A Latino family has moved from Jackson Heights to the far more upscale Forest Hills in Queens. Nelson (Leguizamo) has even installed in the backyard a swimming pool, something that he never saw in their old neighborhood. His daughter, Toni (Rebecca Jimenez), is getting married and it promises to be quite the blowout. More important, his son, Nick (Trey Santiago-Hudson), is returning home from a long stint in a mental hospital.

You may already be thinking of Paddy Chayevsky’s “The Catered Affair” or Frank D. Gilroy’s “The Subject Was Roses.” At first glance, it’s all pretty soggy kitchen-sink stuff, and even the usually brilliant set designer Arnulfo Maldonado appears to have succumbed, decorating Patti (Luna Lauren Velez) and Nelson’s house from the nearest outlet furniture store. That swimming pool is central to the story and should never be out of sight. And yet Maldonado, under the not-always-steady direction of Ruben Santiago-Hudson, often allows this status symbol to be obscured by a very messy kitchen in need of drastic renovation.

Fortunately, the seeds of a far better drama are planted in this sketchy first act. Nelson’s plans to save his laundromat business don’t really come into focus until Act 2 when Leguizamo takes something as mundane as the “mats,” as Nelson calls his business, and gives them all the weight of Joe Keller’s World War II munitions factory in Arthur Miller’s “All My Sons.” That’s quite a theatrical feat, and equally effective, Leguizamo never softens his fierce performance to paint the harsh contours of Nelson’s rigid world view.

Trey Santiago-Hudson makes the son’s pain palpable from the moment this character’s parents resort to old mistakes. And one can’t fault the other portrayals, of Nelson’s future son-in-law (Bradley James Tejeda), his sister (Rosa Evangelina Arredondo) and a neighbor (Sarah Nina Hayon). How unusual it is nowadays for a playwright to eschew the two-hander format and deliver a full extended family and community on stage!  

Where Leguizamo and director Santiago-Hudson run into trouble are a number of scenes that deliver tiny capsules of drama from the characters’ fraught past. There’s a reason playwrights like Miller, Tennessee Williams and Eugene O’Neill took at least three hours to tell their stories of troubled families. It takes time to develop these complicated, often panic-stricken lives. “The Other Americans” clocks in at two hours and fifteen minutes with intermission. Short scenes that gives us Nelson’s own traumatic childhood and Toni’s inferiority complex are introduced and resolved only minutes later. What’s needed is a setup in Act 1 and then a slow festering in the second act.

What Leguizamo achieves, fortunately, is far greater: a true American tragedy.

The post ‘The Other Americans’ Off Broadway Review: John Leguizamo Channels Arthur Miller’s Best With Uncompromising Tragedy appeared first on TheWrap.

An in-the-closet gay teenager, Ulysses (Bryson Battle) finds love, identity and family not in the conventional Sunday church that he and his homophobic aunt (Joaquina Kalukango) attend but rather the Saturday Church, a social club that offers meals and clothing to gay and trans youth, many of whom are homeless. No quicker can you say “drag balls,” which the Saturday Church also houses, than you’ve got the ideal environment for lots of big and loud musical numbers. The appropiately colorful and kinky costumes are by Qween Jean.

I came to this new stage musical under less than ideal circumstances, having seen its source material, the 2017 film “Saturday Church,” sensitively written and directed by Damon Cardasis. The stage musical’s book by Cardasis and James Ijames tells the same story with a couple of jiggers — one great, the other somewhat less so. On stage, every little and subtly detailed moment in the film has been blown up to the size of a Broadway musical like “Kinky Boots or, for that matter, “Hello, Dolly!” In the film, Cardasis achieved the remarkable feat of combining the casually delivered musical numbers of “La La Land” with the heartbreak of Italian neo-realism. What Vittorio De Sica and Roberto Rossellini achieved with nonprofessional actors, Cardasis did with Luka Kain playing Ulysses in the film. Kain is not so much effeminate as he is fragile, and his is not so much a performance as it is an embodiment. There aren’t more than a half dozen songs, by Nathan Larson, and when a character starts singing, it’s always a bit of a jolt but the music is never more than someone thinking out loud.

That approach probably wouldn’t work on stage. Instead of Larson’s quiet ballads, Sia provides her signature dance music, supplemented by “additional lyrics” by Cardasis and Ijames and “additional music” by Honey Dijon. The movie is heartbreaking. The stage musical is ostentatious and is at its very best when the characters are singing and dancing. The good news: There’s a lot of singing and dancing, with choreographer Darrell Grand Moultrie delivering one showstopper after another.

Where Cardasis and Ijames’s book diverges from the screenplay is Black Jesus, who narrates the show and acts as Ulysses’ fairy godmother. J. Harrison Ghee plays this drag queen, as well as Pastor Lewis at the less-than-friendly Sunday church that Ulysses and his aunt attend. Clearly, Ghee’s Tony Award-winning stint in “Some Like It Hot” was just a warmup for the similar gay/straight portrayal this actor essays to perfection here. Such a singular talent, Ghee is getting musicals tailor-made to what is a very unique persona.

Much less wonderful is giving the trans character Ebony (B Noel Thomas, being appropriately grand) a back story that involves a lover who committed suicide. To paraphrase Erich Segal, love is always having to say you’re sorry. The movie “Saturday Church” causes heartbreak because its characters never ask for our sympathy. The stage musical “Saturday Church” never stops begging for it.

Luka Kain’s performance in the film version is so indelible I couldn’t get it out of my head while watching Bryson Battle present an entirely different Ulysses. On stage, when this teenager runs away from home, it surprised me that his mother (Kristolyn Lloyd) became distraught. Because Battle is a big, robust man and he appears on stage to be pushing 30, I thought Mom would be delighted that he’d finally, finally left the nest.

What Battle does bring to the role is a gorgeous singing voice and his falsetto almost makes up for what his acting lacks. He first achieved fame on the 24^th season of “The Voice,” where he “earned a four-chair turn during the Blind Auditions,” whatever that is. Battle is 22 years old.

Whitney White had quite the 2024-25 theater season. This director kicked it off with the great play “Liberation,” which transfers to Broadway later this year, and she single-handedly sank the first Broadway revival of “The Last Five Years” with her misguided direction. With “Saturday Church,” White’s direction sets up Moultrie’s production numbers effectively, but the book scenes when the actors attempt to earn our tears invariably lag. Fortunately, Cardasis and Ijames keep their hackneyed kitchen-sink dialogue to a minimum.

The post ‘Saturday Church’ Off Broadway Review: ‘Kinky Boots’ Now Has a Younger, Flashier Brother appeared first on TheWrap.

I generally hate being “taught” anything in the theater, but for me, it’s about the truth with respect to “Mexodus.” Unlike some critics, I often invite as my guest someone who might know more about the subject matter on stage that evening than I do. In the case of “Mexodus,” I invited my Spanish instructor, born in Mexico. On the way into the Minetta Lane, he asked me, “Do you know about the Mexodus?” I had to reply no, beyond it being the title of the show we were about to see. When he told me that people back in the middle of the 19th Century left the United States for Mexico, I replied, “You mean, leaving Mexico to come here, right?“

Clearly there are things taught in schools in Guadalajara that weren’t taught in America decades ago, much less now.

Not to make this new musical sound like a history lesson, when Quijada and Robinson tells us the Mexodus story at the top of the show, my mind flipped to that scene in “Giant” where Elizabeth Taylor tells Rock Hudson, “We really stole Texas from Mexico, didn’t we, Mr. Benedict.”

In 1848, to be precise. Blacks who found themselves free in Mexico’s Texas suddenly found themselves slaves in America’s Texas until after the Civil War.

For Robinson, the story is personal because it’s his family history. He plays a slave named Henry who escapes to the Rio Grande but has to kill a white man in the process. Once in Mexico, Henry sleeps on the rented property of Carlos (Quijada) who may turn this Black man into Texas bounty hunters for a hefty fee. From there, “Mexodus” tells a very thrilling tale.

Quijada and Robinson sing and play about a dozen instruments between them. The musical is subtitled “a two-person live-looped new musical.” Now, I know as much about synthesizers as I do the real Mexodus story, but Quijada and Robinson often begin playing an instrument and then the music is live-looped on the synthesizer. Throughout the show, the two performers keep tapping little gadgets strewn around the stage to cue the music. It turns into a fascinating visual leitmotif, one that gives an intriguing accent to Riw Rakkulchon junkyard of a set. You’ll want to explore this heap of garbage. Also fun are the costumes, by David Mendizabal, which, among other delightful details, feature spurs on Carlos’ sneakers.

Quijada and Robinson’s score has the immediate, infectious quality of folk music, but to a hip-hop beat. They are charismatic performers, and it will be difficult to find anyone to replace them since “Mexodus” requires multi-talented musician-singers. Quijada and Robinson as actors, however, don’t always express all the colors of their music and their book, which provides some very hefty dramatic scenes.

In addition to the costumes, Mendizabal directs “Mexodus.” He turns it into a ride that travels with incredible speed and excitement.

The post ‘Mexodus’ Off Broadway Review: One of America’s Darker Chapters Now Explodes With Music appeared first on TheWrap.

The current revival of “Art” opened Tuesday at the Music Box, and it is a reminder of how far the theater has traveled since the late 20th Century.

First off, while Reza’s play won that Tony right before the turn of the millenium, there are at least a dozen better plays that opened last season in New York City. And second, the two major topics of Reza’s play hark back to a less jaded time when modern art and psychiatry could provoke such controversy.

“Controversy” is probably the wrong word. Even in 1998, modern art and psychiatry were joked about relentlessly in TV network sitcoms. No matter, there was Reza, the premiere maker of boulevard comedies at the time, more than ready to run those two subjects through the laugh wringer one more time.

In “Art,” Zerge has bought a painting that is basically a white canvas and his friend Marc calls it “shit.” Yvan is their sad-sack friend who keeps switching sides on this major discussion. Yvan is also getting married, and halfway through the play he spills his guts on a major problem he has regarding wedding invitations. It goes on and on, and, of course, Corden milks the extended moment for everything he’s got in a performance that screams, “Give me the Tony!”

In this respect, “Art” is a poor man’s “Glengarry Glenross.” Here are plays that are often revived because stars want to appear in them so they can deliver these showy acting-class scenes.

Watching this revival, you might wonder why Harris and Cannavale didn’t switch roles; the change would have given their characters’ ongoing fight more frisson. The two actors are cast to type here, with Harris playing the persnickety pretentious one who has bought the painting and Cannavale playing the rough philistine whose idea of art ended sometime before the Impressionists.

After all the shouting and yelling in “Art,” Reza glibly resolves the men’s differences in an epilogue that smacks of contrivance. The play should be titled “Kitsch.”  

Scott Ellis directs.

The post ‘Art’ Broadway Review: At Least Bobby Cannavale, James Corden and Neil Patrick Harris Are Having Fun appeared first on TheWrap.

The enormous success of this play shows that Broadway should have been paying attention long ago to downtown comedies featuring drag performers. Charles Busch’s “Red Scare on Sunset” (1991) and “The Divine Sisters” (2010), as well as Charles Ludlam’s “Galas” (1983) and “The Mystery of Irma Vep” (1984), come to mind. The only thing these wildly anarchic works lacked to travel uptown was an adventurous producer.

Impresarios should make a trip to the Little Island where a brilliant revival of “Galas” opened Sunday at The Amph. Here’s a show that’s more than ready for Broadway.

For me, the original production of “Galas,” based on the life of Maria Callas, remains a theater high point. I will never forget Ludlam’s Maria Magdalena Galas emerging from a blast of smoke as the train roared onto the tiny stage at the Ridiculous Theatrical Company’s basement theater on Sheridan Square. Ludlam wasn’t only a great actor and playwright; he also could direct and often delivered astounding coups de theatre in that cramped space.

I might be committing an act of blasphemy by even suggesting that Anthony Roth Costanzo is even better than Ludlam in the title role. The famous counter tenor is credited here with “additional music selections” and they are remarkable. Ludlam didn’t sing in his “Galas.” Costanzo does in this revival and his delivery of such classics as “Casta diva” and “Vissi d’arte” is nothing short of phenomenal. Memory may have failed me, but I don’t remember the original production featuring so many musical interludes and short blasts of orchestral excerpts from operas to punctuate the comedy. It all works marvelously under the very flashy direction of Eric Ting.

The stylish sets by Mimi Lien and the operatic costumes by Hahnj Jang put to shame what’s typically produced at New York City’s other major outdoor stage, the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. Very diva-esque, Costanzo uses another designer, Jackson Wiederhoeft, for his costumes. These outfits are so good that a couple of them receive their own ovation when they first appear on stage.

Jang, however, tops anything Wiederhoeft has designed for Costanzo with his costumes for Pope Sixtus VII and the Prelate; in those two roles, Samora La Perdida and Austin Durant, respectively, do those outrageous duds full justice and then some. Galas meets her match in the pontiff who is a far greater diva than the opera singer. This gem of a scene begins with the royally bejeweled pope spanking the black-mesh-encased prelate. It continues with Galas’ maid Bruna (Mary Testa, being awesomely submissive) flagellating herself to show respect and then reaches comic nirvana with Pope Sixtus VII forcing Galas to kneel to kiss his ring.

As good as some of the boys are at doing drag, Carmelita Tropicana in the role of Galas’ husband, Giovanni Baptista Mercanteggini, shows that women can crossdress to great effect too.

Leaving The Amph, a fellow theatergoer made an interesting comment about “Galas.” He said to his date, “It’s a weird play. It begins as a comedy and then goes someplace else.”

Only rarely in “Oh, Mary!” do we see Mary Todd Lincoln as anything but a broad joke. Ludlam’s Galas is quite another creature. She emerges as a comic figure with glimmers of pathos from the moment she steps off that train from Naples to meet Mercanteggini, her future husband and manager. That balance between comedy and drama switches when she falls in love with the shipping magnate Aristotle Plato Socrates Odysseus (Caleb Eberhardt, being much better looking than Aristotle Onassis). She simply calls him Soc.

Since the death of Callas at age 53 in 1977, there have been a slew of movies and documentaries about her life. I’ve seen most of them, and arguably none is more insightful than “Galas.” Callas is reported to have died of heart failure, but Ludlam takes the view, as did director Franco Zeffirelli, that she committed suicide.

“Galas” is a great tragedy that packs several devastating comic punches.

The post ‘Galas’ Off Broadway Review: Sensational Drag Send-Up of Maria Callas Is Ready-Made for Uptown appeared first on TheWrap.

Taking place Oct. 6. at the Symphony Space in New York City, 100% of the proceeds from the performance will mark the start of National Mental Illness Awareness Week. All proceeds will be donated to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), in memory of Management 360 Partner Chris Huvane, who died by an apparent suicide in 2022.

Per the announcement, the play brings “together acclaimed artists for a series of monologues, each offering a raw, personal perspective on mental illness and the emotional and social complexity of the human experience.”

Marisa Tomei, Rosanna Arquette, Lois Smith, Rachel Hilson, Olivia Oguma, Colette McDermott, Derrick Delgado, Luke Ferrari, Doireann Mac Mahon, Clarence Maclin and Mohammad Saleem will also appear. Ensler will direct.

Tickets are on sale here. A second benefit performance of “THIS IS CRAZY!” will be held in Los Angeles some time in 2026.

Huvane was a respected entertainment manager whose clients included Margot Robbie, Julianne Moore, Zoey Deutch, Zach Braff, Margaret Qualley, Jensen Ackles, Henry Winkler and Chadwick Boseman.

The production was developed from the CAA’s philanthropic arm, the CAA Foundation to honor the Huvane’s memory. Ruth-Ann Huvane, mental health advocate, NAMI National Board Member and Huvane’s former sister-in-law, will serve as producer.

“We’re deeply grateful to V for bringing these powerful stories to the stage and for choosing NAMI as the beneficiary,” NAMI CEO Daniel H. Gillison, Jr. said in a statement. “At NAMI, we know how much storytelling can reduce stigma, inspire understanding, and create pathways to help and hope. The support from this production will strengthen our work to ensure that people affected by mental health conditions and their families get the care and community they deserve.”

“Chris was adored by all who had the honor of knowing him. He was outspoken about living with and battling depression for years before he died by suicide,” Ruth-Ann Huvane said in a statement. “His experience taught us the importance of providing help and support for people and families affected by mental illness. To honor the life and legacy of Chris, my family and I are committed to supporting NAMI’s mission to provide advocacy, education, support, and public awareness about mental illness. Thank you to NAMI, V, and the CAA Foundation for embarking on this journey to help pay tribute to our brother Chris.”

The 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is a free, 24/7 confidential service that can provide people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress, or those around them, with support, information and local resources. Simply dial 9-8-8.

The post Jane Fonda, Sanaa Lathan, Mark Ruffalo and More Join Benefit Performance of New Eve Ensler Play appeared first on TheWrap.

Porter, who was scheduled to remain in the role of the Emcee through October 19, is expected to make a full recovery, producers said in a statement.

“It is with a heavy heart that we have made the painful decision to end our Broadway run on September 21,” the statement from producer Adam Speers reads. “On behalf of all the producers, we’re so honored to have been able to bring this version of John Kander, Fred Ebb, and Joe Masteroff’s important masterpiece, ‘Cabaret,’ to New York and to have opened the doors to our own Kit Kat Club for the year and a half we have been here.”

“Billy was an extraordinary Emcee, bringing his signature passion and remarkable talent,” Speers continued. “We wish Billy a speedy recovery and I look forward to working with him again in the very near future. I personally invite audiences to return to the Kit Kat Club one last time to see the incandescent Marisha Wallace as Sally Bowles, alongside the remarkably talented Marty and David, two actors who have been giving soul-stirring performances as Emcee since we first opened last April.”

Porter’s role will be played by alternates Marty Lauter and David Merino.

Porter and the show’s cast brought the production to the States last month after a successful tour in London.

The post ‘Cabaret’ Closes After Star Billy Porter Is Diagnosed With ‘Serious’ Case of Sepsis appeared first on TheWrap.