EGN NEWS DESK
‘Mary Jane’
Rachel McAdams makes her Broadway debut in Amy Herzog’s play about an impossibly upbeat mom caring for a gravely sick youngster and navigating the byzantine well being care system.
From our assessment:
[Herzog] is just not considering locking down that means. Like all nice performs, “Mary Jane” catches mild from completely different instructions at completely different instances, revealing completely different concepts. On the opposite aspect of the worst of Covid, “Mary Jane” feels much less like a father or mother’s cry for extra life than an inquest into the that means of loss of life.
Through June 16 on the Samuel J. Friedman Theater. Read the complete assessment.
Critic’s Pick
A household drama that ‘feels prefer it’s a therapeutic.’
‘Mother Play’
Paula Vogel’s tragicomedy is a showcase for Jessica Lange, who performs a ferocious matriarch to a sister and brother performed by Celia Keenan-Bolger and Jim Parsons.
From our assessment:
Nearly parodic in her female grace, [Lange’s Phyllis] can be as laborious as buffed, polished nails. Phyllis is in some methods a monster, however Vogel doesn’t visitors in monsters. As a author, she understands that individuals do horrible issues for unterrible causes — out of affection, out of concern, out of loneliness.
Through June 16 on the Helen Hayes Theater. Read the complete assessment.
critic’s decide
A present that every one the critics love.
‘Stereophonic’
David Adjmi’s rock drama, with songs by an actual rocker (Will Butler), follows a Seventies band (not in contrast to Fleetwood Mac) on the cusp of fame by way of the extended, drug-fueled course of of creating a brand new album.
From our assessment:
A fly-on-the-wall examine of how folks each want and viciously destroy one another, “Stereophonic” is a fiery household drama, as electrifying as any since “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” Its real-time dissection of creating music — a collaboration between flawed, gifted artists wrangled into unison — is ingeniously entertaining and an incisive meta commentary on the character of artwork.
Through Aug. 18 on the Golden Theater. Read the complete assessment.
critic’s decide
A mother-and-daughter love story to sing alongside to.
‘Hell’s Kitchen’
This jukebox musical attracts from Alicia Keys’s personal coming-of-age story and hit-filled discography to color a portrait of a 17-year-old woman changing into an artist.
From our assessment:
“Hell’s Kitchen” has earned its place on Broadway: The revised present is thrilling. … [The principal actors] excel in numerous types however by no means really feel at odds with each other or with the rating. … The motion pulses with life and is totally built-in into the present’s total aesthetics, however it’s the eye to element that’s memorable.
At the Shubert Theater. Read the complete assessment.
A buzzy revival that rips the pores and skin off the unique.
‘Cabaret’
Rebecca Frecknall’s revival, first seen in London, options Eddie Redmayne because the macabre Emcee of the Kit Kat Club in Thirties Berlin, on the sting of financial and religious catastrophe.
From our assessment:
Frecknall’s staging … is spectacular when in additive mode, illuminating the basic rating by John Kander and Fred Ebb, and the amazingly sturdy ebook by Joe Masteroff. But too typically a misguided try to resuscitate the present breaks its ribs.
At the August Wilson Theater. Read the complete assessment.
Singing the suffragist story in tune.
‘Suffs’
Shaina Taub’s musical traces the heroic and generally harmful marketing campaign for the American ladies’s proper to vote, from 1913 by way of ratification of the nineteenth Amendment in 1920.
From our assessment:
By the tip, it appears like a rally, full with mottos and banners — which, relying on what you need from a musical, isn’t essentially a criticism. “Suffs” is … a superb present and good for the world. I even shed a number of political tears. But to be nice, a musical (like an amazing motion) should seize you by the throat. “Suffs” too typically settles for holding up indicators.
At the Music Box Theater. Read the complete assessment.
A basic Black tackle ‘The Wizard of Oz.’
‘The Wiz’
The Tony-winning musical re-envisioning of “The Wizard of Oz” will get a makeover in Schele Williams’s new manufacturing.
From our assessment:
This Dorothy and her journey, like the general route, is vivid and tidy however falls brief in character. The animated backdrops of Oz typically have a cutesy, over-glossed Pixar-movie really feel. … All of which is to say that “The Wiz” is a nice, serviceable time on the theater, however as a brand new manufacturing of a musical with a legacy of bringing Blackness to considered one of Hollywood’s and Broadway’s favourite fairy tales, it’s much less satisfying.
Through Aug. 18 on the Marquis Theater. Read the complete assessment.
‘Chekhov with every little thing, besides the principle factor.’
‘Uncle Vanya’
Heidi Schreck brings a easy, devoted but colloquial new model of Chekhov’s basic to the stage with a starry forged that features Steve Carell.
From our assessment:
If Vanya is correctly no hero on this amusing however not often deeply affecting manufacturing, it’s as a result of he’s nobody in any respect. He despairs and disappears.
Through June 16 on the Vivian Beaumont Theater. Read the complete assessment.
’80s nostalgia courtesy of Huey Lewis.
‘The Heart of Rock and Roll’
Big hits and lesser-known tracks are shoehorned right into a jukebox musical with a generic plot a couple of man determining which of his goals to chase.
From our assessment:
“The Heart of Rock and Roll” is just not a lot a Huey Lewis (and the News) musical because the Huey Lewis of musicals: not taking itself too critically, doing what it does effectively, and simply blissful to be on Broadway. … Its easygoing good spirits are bolstered by stable craftsmanship, and it’d be foolish to show up our noses at that.
At the James Earl Jones Theater. Read the complete assessment.
