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  Theatre in Review: The Cherry Orchard (Park Avenue Armory)
With a Russian playwright, a British adaptor/director, and a Korean cast, one approaches this Cherry Orchard with fear and trembling: Are we about to scale a theatrical Tower of Babel? Far from it: The fascinating thing about ...
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Theatre in Review: In Honor of Jean-Michel Basquiat (New York Theatre Workshop)
Is Roger Guenveur Smith an actor or a medium? I'm not so sure. His previous pieces, about Huey Newton and Rodney King, were virtual seances, featuring performances that felt more like spirit possession than standard acting technique ...
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Theatre in Review: America, Who Hurt You? (National Black Theatre/Theatre for a New Audience)
Talk about tall orders: In her new solo show, Sarah Jones wants to do nothing less than heal our fractured, fractious republic, which she correctly views as locked in a perpetual culture-war cycle even as it slides into fascism and ...
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Theatre in Review: The Body of Mary (The Gym@Judson)
The Body of Mary, a trilogy of sketches, is subtitled "a play in three acts (of God)," which should let you know what you're in for. Playwright Katie Cappiello takes a dim view of the Annunciation and Nativity ...
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Theatre in Review: Lean-To (59E59)
Near the end of Lean-To, a woman erupts into a thoroughly justified rant that jolts this sleepy play with a few volts of electricity. Playwright Stephen Sheffer has thrown together three hikers on a nature trail ...
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Theatre in Review: Garry Starr: Classic Penguins (Studio Seaview)
Some clowns perform without a net; Damien Warren-Smith performs without his pants. In Garry Starr, Classic Penguins, he is clad -- if that's the word I want -- in a black swallowtail coat, an Elizabethan ruff, flippers ...
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Theatre in Review: The Ford/Hill Project (Waterwell at BAM's Fishman Space)
Alas, we live in a perfect time for documentary theatre, a format in which the calm, unemotional presentation of excerpts from the official record inevitably lays bare the scoundrels among us. Only a month or two ago, we had a revival of
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Theatre in Review: Paranormal Activity (August Wilson Theatre)
Broadway meets Blumhouse in this stage variant of the supernaturally successful film series, a high-gloss rendering of the kind of inexpensive horror film that opens on almost any weekend, looking for a quick cash-out. It's the handiwork ...
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Theatre in Review: The Real Ivanov (Lynn F. Angelson Theatre)
This revival of an early Anton Chekhov play could be significantly improved by simply adding a few furnishings. Jiyoun Chang, best known as a lighting designer, takes on the scenic design here, too, and her approach makes any ...
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Theatre in Review: The House of the Negro Insane (Negro Ensemble Company)
In his new play, Terence Anthony unearths one of the more appalling aspects of life under Jim Crow (and that's saying something): the mental institutions where so-called insane members of the Black community were warehoused under ...
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Theatre in Review: The Vessel (59E59)
Drake, Missy, and Viggo, the trio who populate Brendan George's play, don't have the worst jobs in New York, but they might have the strangest. All three are employed as "park ambassadors" at the Hudson Yards tourist attraction ...
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Theatre in Review: An American Daughter (La Femme Theatre Productions/Pershing Square Signature Center)
"It's amazing how quickly popular opinions change," remarks one of the Washington swamp creatures populating Wendy Wasserstein's 1997 play. Truer words were never spoken: A ripped-from-the-headlines tale about a thwarted federal ...
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Theatre in Review: The Winter's Tale (New York Shakespeare Festival/Delacorte Theater)
It's high time we stopped apologizing for The Winter's Tale. Time and again -- and I'm far from alone in this -- I've begun reviews noting the play's difficult, bifurcated, royal-tragedy-meets-pastoral-comedy structure, ...
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Theatre in Review: The Pass (La Mama ETC)
It's lonely at the top, especially if you're a closeted, self-loathing soccer star, a point made early and often in The Pass. First seen at the Royal Court in 2014 and filmed with Russell Tovey in 2016, John Donnelly's ...
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Theatre in Review: Disruption (Pershing Square Signature Center)
As if we don't have enough problems -- what with OpenAI and Claude running amok, and half of the country's English majors turning to Copilot to find out how Middlemarch turns out -- here comes John David Washington with an ...
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Theatre in Review: The Saviors (Atlantic Theater Company)
Everywhere you look, there are crises of faith in The Saviors, and not all of them are about God. The playwright Bubba Weiler, who touched on religious matters in last season's Well, I'll Let You Go, here ...
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Theatre in Review: Shifters (Cherry Lane Theatre)
Des and Dre, the young couple at the heart of Shifters, are, without question, soulmates, a status that, rather than generating joy, ironically leaves them feeling irresolute and uncertain. Bright, accomplished, and damaged ...
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Theatre in Review: The Whoopi Monologues (Lincoln Center Theater/Mitzi E. Newhouse)
Something is happening at Lincoln Center Theater, and I'm not sure what to make of it; a company that for years matched provocative new plays with canny, carefully chosen revivals is suddenly playing it awfully safe. Indeed, under the ...
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Theatre in Review: Are You Now or Have You Ever Been (City Center Stage I)
This revival of Eric Bentley's 1972 docudrama about the Hollywood Red Scare, adapted from transcripts of the House Un-American Activities Committee's hearings, causes a strange kind of double vision. One the one hand, it fills one ...
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Theatre in Review: The Potluck (Soho Rep/INTAR at Peter Jay Sharp Theatre)
The Potluck is a musical about a playwright trying to write a musical. If that's not incestuous enough for you, consider this: Cesar Alvarez's protagonist, named Cesar, has been commissioned to create a show about an ...
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