Kecia Lewis as Miss Liza Jane and Maleah Joi Moon as Ali in Hell’s Kitchen. Marc J. Franklin
Alicia Cook, a resident of Manhattan Plaza on West 43rd once upon a time, changed her name to Alicia Keys in part because of the 88s on her piano and the doors they would unlock for her. That was 27 years and 16 Grammys ago, when she was just 16. Her debut album, Songs in A Minor, came out when she was 20 and won her the first five of those Grammys. These days she’s writing for Broadway. Her jukebox musical Hell’s Kitchen — now transplanted at the Shubert Theater four blocks away from the subsidized housing complex she grew up in — is a hometown favorite, winning 13 Tony nominations, one for each year Keys worked on the show. “Greatness can’t be rushed,” she’s said.
The show (with a book by Kristoffer Diaz) recounts a fictional facsimile of Keys’s budding years of creativity in the projects, sprinkling in new songs with her best-known r&b, hip-hop, and pop hits like “If I Ain’t Got You,” “Girl on Fire,” and “Empire State of Mind.” Maleah Joi Moon plays Ali, a 17-year-old girl in freefall, and Shoshana Bean is her single mom, but but a third character emerging from the sidelines proves to be the play’s most memorable: Miss Liza Jane (Kecia Lewis), a no-nonsense teacher who sparks—and deepens—the teen’s musical talent, giving it focus and direction: Voila! a songwriter is born.
Two weeks ago Lewis got the Lucille Lortel Award and Actors’ Equity’s Richard Seff Award. Lastweek the Outer Critics Circle crowned her Outstanding Featured Performer in a Broadway Musical. Yep, she’s up for two more yet-to-be-determined awards: the Drama Desk and the Tony.
Not only does Lewis strike a compelling presence in the show, she also makes her mark musically with a couple of Keys songs, “Perfect Way to Die” and “Authors of Forever.” The creative collaboration that went into making these songs stage-worthy cemented the bond between the singer and the songwriter. “She wants to know what your ideas are, what you’re thinking, how you’re building the character,” Lewis tells Observer of Keys. “And she was kind enough to share with me what she was thinking when she actually wrote those two songs—what was going on in her heart and mind—and then allowing me to bring out my own version of that, my own truth.”
Alicia Keys and Kecia Lewis attend the 77th Annual Tony Awards Meet The Nominees Press Event at Sofitel New York on May 02, 2024 in New York City. Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions
Lewis comes to the role of a teacher and mentor with experience—she’s spent most of her days seesawing between teaching and theater. “Hell’s Kitchen is a perfect match for where I am in my life and my career,” she says. At the Atlantic Theater, she’s taught stage acting. She’s done some teaching at her alma mater, NYU, and conducted a master class at Juilliard. In leaner times, she’s even been known to work survival jobs at elementary schools.
Fortunately, there haven’t been a lot of those. Broadway and Off-Broadway have kept her busy, originating or creating or replacing—roles like Asaka in Once Upon This Island, “Mama” Morton in Chicago, the title role in Mother Courage, et al. The original cast of Ain’t Misbehavin’ revue reconvened for the 1988 revival, and she stood by for Nell Carter and Armelia McQueen.
When The Drowsy Chaperone arrived on Broadway in 2006, Lewis arrived flying a plane as Trix the Aviatrix. “That’s probably in my top five theater experiences,” she figures. “This was a cast of people who, half-kiddingly, considered ourselves the oldest cast on Broadway. The baby of our company was the star of the show, Sutton Foster. She was 30. The rest of us, mostly, were 45 and above, but there was a settled heart and spirit about that, an enjoyment and confidence about what we have been doing so long. That kind of atmosphere, on stage and off, made for an amazingly good time.” The cast hung out together because they enjoyed each other’s company. “On Sundays, Sutton brought in bagels and breakfast things, and we’d meet up before the matinee.”
Hell’s Kitchen’s Miss Liza Jane, her new favorite role, is a composite of several Manhattan Plaza people who help Alicia find her way. Audiences adore this character. Coming and going, Lewis gets her claps and her laughs. Lewis attributes the audience’s warm embrace to fact that almost everyone has had someone in their life like Miss Liza Jane. “A relative, a neighbor, a school administrator, someone who really saw you and believed in you and pushed you to be your best,” she says. “I have been blessed to have quite a few Miss Liza Janes in my life over the years. One in particular that I’m utilizing to create this character: a voice-and-diction teacher of mine in high school—she’s deceased now—Mrs. Koehler. I went to the High School of Performing Arts—the old one on West 46th—and a lot of my classmates would say, ‘Are you doing Mrs. Koehler? Is that Miss Koehler?’”
The film that made that high school famous—Fame—was shot in the summer of ’79, and Lewis didn’t arrive until September of ’79, along with Danny Burstyn, Helen Slater, and Lisa Vidal.
“This is my 40th year in show business!” she gleefully points out. “June 15 will be 40 years to the day when I stepped into the Imperial Theater—age 18—hired by Michael Bennett to begin my journey with Dreamgirls. Now—to have Hell’s Kitchen, to have this kind of role and have it all at this time—is full-circle for me. All this combined in my own life, matched with this character and this group of young people—so many of them making their Broadway debuts—it’s just perfect.”
Some of the plot of Hell’s Kitchen parallels Lewis’ own life, including the problems and worries of a single mom raising an artistically inclined child. Her son, Simon, is almost 21 and “continuing the theater tradition,” his mother beams proudly. “He’s going down the route of stagehand and, right now, is finishing his training at the Roundabout Theater Company’s Internship Program.
“Raising a kid in New York City is a herculean feat. I was lucky enough that I lived in Long Island, so I was a little removed from the city, but the problems still are there—and practically anywhere in this country: the racial undertones of raising Black children or biracial children. We have to train and protect our children with a hyper-vigilance other people don’t know about.”
When Lewis reaches the Shubert Theater every day, her motherhood comes to full bloom, given how many young people are in the cast. “I love that,” she admits. “I think, since I was young, the essence of who I am is a bit of a protector. I’ve always been that. I resisted it when I was young. I wanted to be the ingénue or the pretty girl boys wanted, but I’ve come to embrace and greatly appreciate when young people want to be around me as an older person. I think that’s special.”
The cast calls her Mama. “I didn’t tell them to call me that,” says Lewis. “It’s when they call me Legend that I begin to suspect they’re speaking code for ‘old actress.’”
Fans who didn’t make it to New York City to catch the Broadway revival of “Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch,” starring Leslie Odom, Jr., can catch the comedic play on TV later this month.
PBS will broadcast “Purlie Victorious” on Friday, May 24, at 9 p.m. as part of its Emmy-winning performing arts series “Great Performances.” The show will also be available to watch on the PBS website and app.
“Purlie Victorious” follows a Black preacher’s scheme to reclaim his inheritance and win back his church from a plantation owner. Odom, who grew up in East Oak Lane and attended the Philadelphia High School for Creative and Performing Arts, received a Tony Award nomination last month for playing the titular role. The “Purlie Victorious” revival opened in September 2023 and closed in February. The play, written by Ossie Davis, made its original Broadway debut in 1961 starring Davis.
“I have loved this piece and its author, Mr. Davis, for well over half my life,” Odom said in a release. “We endeavored to live up to the demands of a challenging text and the legacy of a great American. I was thrilled beyond measure to be part of the revival company and now for it to be part of the rich tradition of ‘Great Performances’ on PBS.”
The PBS broadcast of the play was recorded live at the Music Box Theatre in January. It will be part of the “Great Performance” Broadway Best series, which also includes the Free Shakespeare in the Park production of “Hamlet,” Audra McDonald’s 2022 London Palladium concert, and 2023’s “My Favorite Things: The Rodgers & Hammerstein 80th Anniversary Concert,” also from London.
Odom, best known for his Tony-winning breakout role as Aaron Burr in the hit Broadway musical “Hamilton,” has earned a Grammy award and been nominated for multiple Emmys and Oscars throughout his career. He was named to Time’s “100 Most Influential People of 2024” list in April, and joined Philly’s Walk of Fame in 2023.
His fifth full-length album, “When A Crooner Dies,” was released in November, and he stopped by Philadelphia earlier this month to perform a concert at the Miller Theater for his “My Favorite Things” tour.
Jeremy Jordan and Eva Noblezada in The Great Gatsby Evan Zimmerman
There’s something almost quaint about The Great Gatsby’s arrival at the end of a crowded Broadway season (11 new musicals and revivals bowed in the past six weeks). This splashy transfer from New Jersey’s Paper Mill Playhouse assumes a market hungry for a semi-faithful adaptation of F. Scott’s Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel about second lives and broken dreams. Perhaps producers regarded Six and & Juliet as proof of concept: take a literary source or historical footnote, pump it up with dance tunes and quasi-feminism, and rake in the cash. But those shows brazenly deconstruct and dumb down their content for the TikTok–addled hordes; Gatsby, on the other hand, clings to a shred of dignity until, like its title fraudster, it flops into a pool with a bullet in the back.
Don’t misunderstand me: The Great Gatsby is not a smart, tasteful musical that can’t compete with tackier ones. It simply fails to be tacky enough. The jazz-based score by composer Jason Howland and lyricist Nathan Tysen (Paradise Square) ventures into funk, Disney princess ballad, and a touch of Britpop. Despite the eclecticism of the musical palette, none of the songs stick in the ear, despite strenuous vocalizing by Jeremy Jordan (Newsies) and Eva Noblezada (Hadestown). These attractive Broadway vets portray, respectively, nouveau riche mystery man Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan, the girl he loved, who cravenly married the old-money domestic abuser Tom (John Zdrojeski, out-acting everyone on stage). The story—you will know from reading the book or seeing other versions—is narrated by Nick Carraway (Noah J. Ricketts), Daisy’s cousin and Gatsby’s neighbor. Like Gatsby, a veteran of World War I, Nick has a front-row seat to a Jazz-Age New York soaked in bootlegger booze, cynicism, and infidelity.
Noah J. Ricketts, Sara Chase, and John Zdrojeski in The Great Gatsby. Evan Zimmerman
Adapting the novel for a medium dependent on action and plot, there’s a danger in lifting Gatsby out of the ironic and melancholy filter of Nick’s voice. Ricketts may quote lines from the book at the beginning and end of the show, but for the most part we’re left with raw story elements, and they start to resemble a melodramatic parade of morose, wealthy people cheating on each other and secondary (working-class) characters paying for it. Gatsby manipulates Nick into setting up an affair between him and Daisy; Tom looks down his nose at Gatsby, even as he conducts a sordid affair with Myrtle (Sara Chase), the blowzy wife of Wilson (Paul Whitty) a gas-station owner on Long Island. Wilson is mixed up with the bootlegging operations of Gatsby and gangster Meyer Wolfsheim (Eric Anderson) and suffers from a bad conscience. All this seedy stuff goes down much smoother stirred into a cocktail with Fitzgerald’s velvety prose.
The burden is on songs to make us care about the protagonists’ inner lives and struggles. But the numbers are so generic, the lyrics so interchangeable, they add little meat to the characters’ bones, simply reinforcing Gatsby as a self-deluded romantic and Daisy as a woman frustrated with the gender limitations of her time. The b-plot involving Nick’s romance with spunky golfer Jordan Baker (Samantha Pauly) gives off comic sparks but goes nowhere when Nick realizes that Jordan is just as selfish and immoral as the rest of her circle. That arc follows the novel, but makes you wish book writer Kait Kerrigan had taken more liberties with the material than simply condensing plot and virtue signaling about the sexism of the times. She excises Tom Buchanan’s odious racism (which even the book mocks) and glosses over the late-revealed story of how James Gatz reinvented himself as Jay Gatsby—the story Nick learns after the great one’s death—which would have made a touching song. Instead, a chorus of gyrating flappers and jazz daddies slink back on to gloat over his death: “Look how he tricked ’em / Now he’s a victim / Well, at least he made a splash / New Money!”
Noah J. Ricketts and Samantha Pauly in The Great Gatsby.Matthew Murphy
Everyone wants to profit off Gatsby. The novel passed into public domain in 2021; there are bound to be more adaptations, hopefully bolder ones. It’s worth looking to the past for clues. The theater troupe Elevator Repair Service unlocked the classic by performing every word in a seven-hour reading/séance called Gatz. In the exact opposite direction, filmmaker Baz Luhrmann deployed movie stars and hyperkinetic camera work to evoke a fever-dream exaltation of the text. Both versions are infinitely more intelligent and engaging than what’s on at the Broadway Theatre. We await word about another musical take with tunes co-written by Florence Welch trying out in Boston next month.
Who knows how long this busy yet unfocused Marc Bruni staging can survive in a highly competitive, largely lackluster season. Providing distraction from tepid songs and plodding lyrics there’s eye candy in Paul Tate de Poo III’s gilded sets and copious video projections, and Linda Cho’s glittery costumes. A couple of prop antique cars roll center stage in freshly waxed glory, promising a joy ride that never comes. Those looking for escapism in an oversaturated and underwhelming spring, be warned: The Great Gatsby gets as much mileage as the yellow Rolls-Royce. Flashy body, no engine.
The Great Gatsby | 2hrs 30mins. One intermission. | Broadway Theatre | 1681 Broadway | 212-239-6200 | Buy Tickets Here
After a final, frantic push to open the last raft of Broadway shows before the eligibility window closed, the final list of almost 40 plays and musicals vying for Tony Award nominations this year are ready and hoping for their closeups.Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Renée Elise Goldsberry will announce nominees for the 26 competitive Tony Awards on Tuesday morning, the result of voting by the 60 members of the nominating committee.Video above: Actors from ‘The Lion King’ share their experiences of being on a Broadway stageThe spring barrage — 14 shows opened in an 11-day span this year — is not unusual these days as producers hope their work will be fresh in the mind of voters ahead of the Tony Awards ceremony on June 16. But no clear single musical juggernaut has emerged, like the megahit “Hamilton” in 2016 or a critical darling like last year’s “Kimberly Akimbo.”One possible change this year indicates women may be poised to outnumber the men for the first time in directing nominations. Nearly half of the 21 musicals — new and revivals — that opened this season were helmed by a woman or featured a team of co-directors where at least one was a woman. Five out of the season’s 16 new plays and play revivals were also staged by women.The 2022 Tony Awards currently holds the record for most female directing nominees, with four total across the two races. Only 10 women have gone on to win the directing crown.The eligible shows this season include reworking of existing movies or books — “The Outsiders,” “The Great Gatsby,” “The Notebook,” “Back to the Future” and “Water for Elephants” — and new works transferring over to Broadway, like the suffrage play “Suffs,” the dance-heavy Sufjan Stevens-scored “Illinoise,” the rock band imploding “Stereophonic” and “Hell’s Kitchen,” loosely based on Alicia Keys’ life.There are some coincidences, like that Huey Lewis & The News songs are heard at both his jukebox show “The Heart of Rock and Roll” and an unconnected musical of “Back to the Future.” Rachel McAdams, who made a breakthrough in the film version of “The Notebook,” is competing against the musical version of that movie a few blocks away in the play “Mary Jane.” Plus, “The Wiz” and “Wicked” now share Broadway, and Nazis are in both “Cabaret” and a musical about artist Tamara de Lempicka.This season attracted plenty of big stars to Broadway in addition to McAdams, like Jessica Lange and Jim Parsons in “Mother Play,” Steve Carell in a revival of “Uncle Vanya,” Eddie Redmayne in a new “Cabaret,” Liev Schreiber in “Doubt,” “Succession” star Jeremy Strong in a revival of “An Enemy of the People” and Sarah Paulson in the play “Appropriate.”There were some firsts this season, including “Here Lies Love” with Broadway’s first all-Filipino cast, as well as mostly Filipino producers, including singer H.E.R., comedian Jo Koy and Black Eyed Peas’ Apl.de.Ap. And seven openly autistic actors starred in “How to Dance in Ohio,” a first for Broadway.Big musical revival splashes were made by “Monty Python’s Spamalot,” “The Wiz,” “The Who’s Tommy,” Stephen Sondheim’s “Merrily We Roll Along” and the fourth revival of “Cabaret.” Academy Award winner and Tony Award-nominee Ariana DeBose, who hosted both the 2023 and 2022 ceremonies, will be back this year and will produce and choreograph the opening number.This year’s location — the David H. Koch Theater — is the home of New York City Ballet and in the same sprawling building complex as Lincoln Square Theater, which houses the Broadway venue Beaumont Theater.Like last year, the three-hour main telecast will air on CBS and stream on Paramount+ from 8 p.m.-11 p.m. EDT/5 p.m.-8 p.m. PDT with a pre-show on Pluto TV, and some Tony Awards handed out there on June 16.This season’s Broadway numbers — about $1.4 billion in grosses and 11.1 million tickets — is running slightly less than the 2022-23 season, off about 4% in grosses and down 1% in tickets.
NEW YORK —
After a final, frantic push to open the last raft of Broadway shows before the eligibility window closed, the final list of almost 40 plays and musicals vying for Tony Award nominations this year are ready and hoping for their closeups.
Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Renée Elise Goldsberry will announce nominees for the 26 competitive Tony Awards on Tuesday morning, the result of voting by the 60 members of the nominating committee.
Video above: Actors from ‘The Lion King’ share their experiences of being on a Broadway stage
The spring barrage — 14 shows opened in an 11-day span this year — is not unusual these days as producers hope their work will be fresh in the mind of voters ahead of the Tony Awards ceremony on June 16. But no clear single musical juggernaut has emerged, like the megahit “Hamilton” in 2016 or a critical darling like last year’s “Kimberly Akimbo.”
One possible change this year indicates women may be poised to outnumber the men for the first time in directing nominations. Nearly half of the 21 musicals — new and revivals — that opened this season were helmed by a woman or featured a team of co-directors where at least one was a woman. Five out of the season’s 16 new plays and play revivals were also staged by women.
The 2022 Tony Awards currently holds the record for most female directing nominees, with four total across the two races. Only 10 women have gone on to win the directing crown.
The eligible shows this season include reworking of existing movies or books — “The Outsiders,” “The Great Gatsby,” “The Notebook,” “Back to the Future” and “Water for Elephants” — and new works transferring over to Broadway, like the suffrage play “Suffs,” the dance-heavy Sufjan Stevens-scored “Illinoise,” the rock band imploding “Stereophonic” and “Hell’s Kitchen,” loosely based on Alicia Keys’ life.
There are some coincidences, like that Huey Lewis & The News songs are heard at both his jukebox show “The Heart of Rock and Roll” and an unconnected musical of “Back to the Future.” Rachel McAdams, who made a breakthrough in the film version of “The Notebook,” is competing against the musical version of that movie a few blocks away in the play “Mary Jane.” Plus, “The Wiz” and “Wicked” now share Broadway, and Nazis are in both “Cabaret” and a musical about artist Tamara de Lempicka.
This season attracted plenty of big stars to Broadway in addition to McAdams, like Jessica Lange and Jim Parsons in “Mother Play,” Steve Carell in a revival of “Uncle Vanya,” Eddie Redmayne in a new “Cabaret,” Liev Schreiber in “Doubt,” “Succession” star Jeremy Strong in a revival of “An Enemy of the People” and Sarah Paulson in the play “Appropriate.”
There were some firsts this season, including “Here Lies Love” with Broadway’s first all-Filipino cast, as well as mostly Filipino producers, including singer H.E.R., comedian Jo Koy and Black Eyed Peas’ Apl.de.Ap. And seven openly autistic actors starred in “How to Dance in Ohio,” a first for Broadway.
Big musical revival splashes were made by “Monty Python’s Spamalot,” “The Wiz,” “The Who’s Tommy,” Stephen Sondheim’s “Merrily We Roll Along” and the fourth revival of “Cabaret.”
Academy Award winner and Tony Award-nominee Ariana DeBose, who hosted both the 2023 and 2022 ceremonies, will be back this year and will produce and choreograph the opening number.
This year’s location — the David H. Koch Theater — is the home of New York City Ballet and in the same sprawling building complex as Lincoln Square Theater, which houses the Broadway venue Beaumont Theater.
Like last year, the three-hour main telecast will air on CBS and stream on Paramount+ from 8 p.m.-11 p.m. EDT/5 p.m.-8 p.m. PDT with a pre-show on Pluto TV, and some Tony Awards handed out there on June 16.
This season’s Broadway numbers — about $1.4 billion in grosses and 11.1 million tickets — is running slightly less than the 2022-23 season, off about 4% in grosses and down 1% in tickets.
For more than half a century, “Cabaret” — the iconic American musical set in Nazi Germany — has been produced, revived and revived again. This story, which touches on sex work, abortion and a complex female protagonist in Sally Bowles, has spoken to audiences generation after generation.
But another element of the production stayed true for nearly the same amount of time: on Broadway, “Cabaret” has exclusively been directed by men. Until now.
The latest revival — “Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club” — just opened at the August Wilson Theatre. For the first time in Broadway’s history, it’s directed by a woman: 38-year-old Rebecca Frecknall. And it’s being staged amidst a historic siege on women’s rights.
As someone who was lucky enough to see the show on opening night, I can attest that, in this production—more than in any other I’ve seen—the parallels between Sally’s experience and that of today’s young women are uncanny. But based on the reviews from some mainstream critics, you’d think the most political part of the show is the cherry schnapps handed out when you arrive.
I’ve seen and loved other productions of “Cabaret”; Sally in particular has long been rightly upheld as a high watermark for nuanced, authentic women on stage. The role has been called the “female Hamlet of musical theater” for good reason.
But at Frecknall’s direction, Gayle Rankin powerfully embodies what is undeniably a Sally of 2024. When she sings the show’s title number (which takes place in this production after the character’s offstage abortion) we see a modern Sally: raw and real; more than likely in emotional and physical pain. She doesn’t sing, dance or exist to please others—including, it should be said, us in the audience. Instead, we see a woman who in spite of everything, has chosen herself. A woman who has chosen to survive.
No shortage of legendary women have portrayed Sally over the decades. But today, I resonate more with this Sally than with any that have come before. And sure enough, in conversations I’ve had with other young women, Rankin’s performance of Sally deeply affected each and every one of them.
We all share the experience of being forced—or knowing that we could be forced any day—to make that kind of impossible decision. We all share a deep gratitude that such a choice is, for now, ours to make. And in carrying those contradictory feelings, we’re all tired of putting on a pretty face and pretending that everything is fine. That’s why this Sally feels like our Sally.
It’s also why I have been so confused as I’ve read the critical reactions to this production. Certain reviews have fixated on the technical aspects of Rankin’s performance, complaining about chaotic energy, a lack of polish, a disquieting undertone. Never mind whether that’s the point.
Like any art, musicals can be intensely subjective experiences; it should be no surprise that some critics couldn’t see themselves in Sally the way I did. And yet: it doesn’t take a female perspective to understand that in the wake of Dobbs, young American women are seeing this story in a new light.
So when a critic ignores the resonance that this authentic, unapologetic Sally has with women of my generation, it makes me wonder: Are we seeing the same show? Are they seeing the same woman? Do we live on the same planet?
This is familiar for women: the implication that our perspectives are not the objective truth. That our pain is not real, or at the very least, not palatable. That our choices must not be intentional—which Frecknall has had to experience herself as male critics wax poetic about what “Cabaret” is actually supposed to be about.
Thankfully, not every Broadway power player feels this way. John Kander, who composed “Cabaret,” described elements of this production as “stunningly reinvented.” Plenty of younger critics and audience members get it, and have praised Rankin for the same realism that others have balked at. Not to mention the palpable joy in the room as this genderqueer, sexually liberated ensemble takes the stage.
Nevertheless, the reaction to “Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club” serves as a stark reminder of how much work is left to be done if Broadway is to truly become the bastion of progressivism that so many of its patrons believe it to be.
That’s why I’ve found it so fulfilling to co-produce other Broadway shows that upend traditional notions of what theater looks like and who participates in it. Every time a production like “A Strange Loop” or “My Son’s a Queer” opens, the conventional wisdom of the industry gets challenged, and those who have historically been left out of that conventional wisdom get a space to come together.
Before proposing to Fraulein Schneider, Herr Schultz says to her, “We’re alive. And what good is it alone?”
That’s the beauty of this production—and of live theater. It brings us together, and it makes us feel alive. By giving us a Sally who felt real—from a director who understands her on the deepest level — “Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club” reminds us that we are different from Sally in one important way: we are not alone.
Meena Harris is an attorney, children’s book author and producer. Her Broadway co-producing credits include “Suffs,” “A Strange Loop,” “Death of a Salesman,” the upcoming Broadway production of “My Son’s A Queer,” as well as impact partner with “& Juliet.”
Steve Carell and Alison Pill in Uncle Vanya.Marc J. Franklin
It’s Chekhov 101 to say his characters inhabit separate worlds that rarely converge. All those rueful doctors, vain landowners, stoic laborers, and pretentious artists jabber across the samovar without really connecting or changing. Sure, they level pistols at each other (and themselves) or profess undying love, but such flashes of passion smack of solipsistic play-acting. Therein lies the comedy dusted with melancholy. Still, if Chekhov’s people are not in the same play, you hope the actors inhabiting them will be. Such is not really the case in Lincoln Center Theater’s starry but arid Uncle Vanya, staged with noncommittal chill by Lila Neugebauer.
Mimi Lien’s scenic design bluntly underscores the sense that these “Russians” (scare quotes because they’re vaguely Americanized) are planets whose orbital paths do not intersect. Her set pieces crouch at the edges of the Vivian Beaumont’s broad stage, emphasizing psychic distance by maximizing negative space. The first two acts have a backyard, cottagecore vibe—picnic table, folding chairs, bench, and a huge black-and-white photograph of birch trees covering the back wall. (All very wood-ish.) The second act brings us inside the home of agricultural manager Vanya (Steve Carell) and his niece Sonya (Alison Pill), but the tasteful, midcentury decor seems equally repelled to the periphery.
The cast of Lincoln Center Theater’s Uncle Vanya. Marc J. Franklin
If the furniture is having an existential crisis, so are the depressed folks perched on it. Vanya is a middle-aged crank who sacrificed love and happiness for duty, drudging for decades on a farm and funneling money to Alexander (Alfred Molina), a pompous fraud of an art professor. Alexander was married to Vanya’s deceased sister, and the homely, naïve Sonya is the product of that union. Elena (Anika Noni Rose), Alexander’s much younger second wife, is an exquisitely bored nymph after whom Vanya lusts—as does family friend Astrov (William Jackson Harper), a local doctor who moonlights in environmentalism and binge drinking. Oh, almost forgot: Sonya loves Astrov, Vanya hates Alexander, and there’s a non-speaking local youth (Spencer Donovan Jones) who casts sad, smoldering looks at Sonya. The last element is an invention by Neugebauer, yet another iteration of unrequited love in this matryoshka of misery.
Uncle Vanya (a new take comes along every few years) is not exactly breakfast—as in, you have to work hard to screw it up—but its performers usually have solid support. Once they’ve polished their patronymics, they can settle into pathos-rich comedy tinged with Chekhov’s prophetic sense that pre-revolutionary Russia was about to crater under the idle protagonists’ feet. One of his signature tricks is musing about the generations to come. “People who are alive a hundred—two hundred years from now,” cynic-idealist Astrov wonders, “what will they think of us? Will they remember us with kindness?” Similar to the way that Shakespeare articulated unseen and unseeable inner life (Hamlet’s inky cloak), Chekhov cultivated anxious futurity in his restless people. Perhaps he was asking himself: Will my extremely specific Slavic material be relevant a century down the road?
William Jackson Harper in Uncle Vanya. Marc J. Franklin
The answer is yes, of course. Unless you’re allergic to Dr. Anton’s blend of bleakness and whimsy, the physician-playwright still grabs us with his clinical yet sympathetic dissection of human frailty. So, what are Neugebauer, her design team (including Kaye Voyce on costumes and Lap Chi Chu and Elizabeth Harper on lights), and an A-list ensemble doing to keep us focused on Vanya’s angsty journey from surly bitterness to…well, catatonic despair? The current version by the formidable Heidi Schreck (What the Constitution Means to Me) doesn’t attempt anything too radical. The language is more or less vernacular American with a light dusting of profanity (three shits, a fuck, a few hells and craps). Despite the modern clothing and furnishings, there are no smartphones or laptops in sight. When I first heard that Schreck was translating, I had this nutty hope she might flip the gender of the title figure. Gimmicky? Yep. But it would be something.
That is, something more than an efficient but lukewarm modern-dress Vanya with fine actors who never quite gel. I’d see Harper (Primary Trust) in anything; he’s a sui generis compound of tetchiness, insecurity and warmth, but I didn’t particularly buy his friendship with Vanya or even his status as doctor. By the third act he has traded hospital scrubs for paint-spattered leisurewear, and you wonder if Astrov’s gone on sabbatical to improve his stippling and brushwork. Carell is the celebrity draw, of course, and it’s neat to see him modulate his movie-star shtick—bashful-teen-trapped-in-middle-aged-dude’s-body—to something rawer and more anguished. For Vanya’s hysterical third-act meltdown, bewailing years of waste, Carell leaps on the kitchen table and crawls across it, screaming at Molina like a plump tabby cat having its midlife crisis.
Others onstage seem either miscast (Rose) or under-directed (Molina), but Pill proves to be the evening’s MVP with a painfully yearning Sonya. The gawky spinster-in-training is red meat for young actors, and Pill radiates nervy panic from every pore. Pale and reedy, she scrunches her face into a rictus of pain, yet never tips into overacting. Rendered in English, some of Chekhov’s pet descriptors (not just in Vanya) are “weird,” “strange,” “stupid” and their variants. To be human is to be a freak, and Pill embodies that brokenness with a palpable heat I wish could have ignited everything around her.
Uncle Vanya | 2hrs 30mins. One intermission. | Vivian Beaumont Theater | 150 W. 65th Street | 212-239-6200 | Buy Tickets Here
April on Broadway, to mangle a phrase from a showtune classic, is bustin’ out all over with no fewer than 14 new plays and musicals set to open before the April 25 Tony Award eligibility cutoff date. So crowded are the final weeks of the 2023-24 theater season that three days each will see the openings of two shows, a Broadway rarity.
Below is a compendium of our reviews. Keep checking back as the list is updated.
Suffs
Shaina Taube in ‘Suffs’
Joan Marcus
Opening night: April 18, 2024 Venue: The Music Box Theatre Director: Leigh Silverman Book, music & lyrics: Shaina Taub Choreography: Mayte Natalio Principal cast: Shaina Taub, Nikki M. James, Jenn Colella, Grace McLean, Hannah Cruz, Kim Blanck, Anastacia McCleskey, Ally Bonino, Tsilala Brock, Nadia Dandashi, Emily Skinner Running time: 2 hr 30 min (including intermission) Official synopsis: “In the seven years leading up to the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, an impassioned group of suffragists — “Suffs” as they called themselves — took to the streets, pioneering protest tactics that transformed the country. They risked their lives as they clashed with the president, the public, and each other. A thrilling story of brilliant, flawed women working against and across generational, racial, and class divides, Suffs boldly explores the victories and failures of a fight for equality that is still far from over.” Deadline’s takeaway:Suffs is enthralling, a smart, funny and beautifully sung musical that brings its chosen moment in history to life just as surely and confidently as Hamilton did for its. That the Suffs era is female-focused — and so less known, in its details, to the general public than the doings of the Founding Fathers — makes Shaina Taub’s creation all the more potent.
The urgency comes through in every aspect of this thrilling production, from the extraordinary performances to an exquisite set design that places the Suffs of 1913-1920 squarely within a Washington D.C. of stately marble and paneled wood, right where they belong.
Taub, the composer and performer best known to New York theatergoers through her inspired work for Shakespeare in the Park in recent years, here takes a big step in scope and ambition, and handily pulls it off. She’s populated Suffs with some dozen or so women who, in one way or another, took part in the fight for suffrage, sometimes agreeing with one another, just as often not, but always coming together when history demands.
Taub, director Leigh Silverman and a pitch-perfect cast bring the era to vivid life by alternately focusing on historical sweep and the personal dramas of the (very real) characters. The Suffs plead their case more than once to no less a personage, however craven, than President Woodrow Wilson (Grace McLean, in a terrifically funny performance). But the real drama — and no small bit of the humor (Suffs is anything but stuffy) — comes from the clashing personalities of the women who share a goal, if, as it so often seems, little else.
Taub plays Alice Paul, the young firebrand who, along with her devoted friend Lucy Burns (Ally Bonino), are determined to bring change to the Suffrage Movement, long (too long) under the cautious domination of the older Susan B. Anthony-era organizers as personified by the dismissive Carrie Chapman Catt (Jenn Colella). Carrie can’t let go of a more polite way of achieving change: the lobbying and kowtowing that for decades has gained little but promises.
Alice and her compatriots aren’t nearly so patient. They want marches, and demonstrations and, in the end, even hunger strikes, tactics that appall the establishment Suffs. But one of the most rewarding aspects of Taub’s vision for Suffs is in the suggestion of how the newcomers and their elders inspire and influence one another is significant ways. We see this in the bond, however tested, between Alice and Carrie, and in a similarly positioned friendship between the crusading Black journalist Ida B. Wells (Nikki M. James) and her older friend Mary Church Terrell (Anastacia McCleskey). James’ performance of the righteous “Wait My Turn” is a musical highlight.
Taub’s music (along with Mayte Natalio’s choreography) is an appealing meld of Americana, showtune, and hints of vaudeville and the Blues, all blending into one of the most incisive and pleasing new scores since Kimberly Akimbo. Suffs, though set (mostly) in the distant past, has much to say about the ongoing struggle for equal rights (Hillary Rodham Clinton and Malala Yousafzai are among the producers). History, and Broadway for that matter, deserve no less.
The Wiz
‘The Wiz’
Jeremy Daniel
Opening night: April 17, 2024 Venue: Marquis Theatre Director: Schele Williams Book: William F. Brown Music & lyrics: Charlie Smalls Additional material: Amber Ruffin Choreography: JaQuel Knight Principal cast: Nichelle Lewis, Wayne Brady, Deborah Cox, Melody A. Betts, Kyle Ramar Freeman, Phillip Johnson Richardson and Avery Wilson. Running time: 2 hr 30 min (including intermission) Official synopsis: “Based on L. Frank Baum’s children’s book, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”, The Wiz takes one of the world’s most enduring (and enduringly white) American fantasies, and transforms it into an all-Black musical extravaganza for the ages.” Deadline’s takeaway: So much has happened in the land of Oz since The Wiz first eased on down the road to Broadway back in 1975, and the most of that so much was Wicked. Raising the bar on all things Baum, Wicked not only added new storylines, approaches and no small amount of stagecraft dazzle to the universe of witches, wizards and an intruder or four that even a teaser trailer for the upcoming film adaptation can rouse fan excitement to dizzying levels.
The once groundbreaking Wiz, in other words, is gonna have a tough yellow brick road to hoe to keep up, and the new Broadway revival, opening tonight at the Marquis, only occasionally meets the challenge. A good cast, though apparently encouraged to over-sing at the drop of a house, works hard to make up for the production’s shortcuts – painted flats are overused, special effects are few, far between and not particularly special, and director Schele Williams breezes past (or completely ignores) some of the well-worn story’s most anticipated beats.
The tornado, for example, barely registers, signified mostly by a swirling chorus of dancers in bland gray, while the Wicked Witch’s castle is rendered as a pseudo-Hadestown boiler room bathed in red light. Budgetary constraints might play a part in some of the disappointments, but surely the Wicked Witch’s liquidation could have been accomplished with something more impressive than a standard hydraulic lift, and why there’s no one to greet Dorothy back in Kansas is anyone’s guess.
The production is not without its charms, though. A relatively brief moment in the musical spotlight by Wayne Brady, as The Wiz, has enough charm (and dance moves) to fuel a cyclone, and JaQuel Knight’s choreography rises way beyond itself in full-ensemble numbers like the Act II opener “The Emerald City.” Other highlights: Melody A. Betts, as Eviline, blowing the roof off the Marquis with “Don’t Nobody Bring Me No Bad News,” and a funny Allyson Kaye Daniel as Dorothy’s good witch greeter. Best of all, the score, however overstuffed, still shines with at least two evergreens: “Ease on Down the Road” and “Home.” Some spells don’t break.
Lempicka
Eden Espinosa in ‘Lempicka’
Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman
Opening night: April 14, 2024 Venue: Longacre Theatre Director: Rachel Chavkin Book and music: Carson Kreitzer (book, lyrics, and original concept), Matt Gould (book and music) Choreography: Raja Feather Kelly Cast: Eden Espinosa, Amber Iman, Andrew Samonsky, George Abud, Natalie Joy Johnson, Zoe Glick, Nathaniel Stampley, Beth Leavel. Running time: 2 hr 30 min (including intermission) Official synopsis: “Spanning decades of political and personal turmoil and told through a thrilling, pop-infused score, Lempicka boldly explores the contradictions of a world in crisis, a woman ahead of her era, and an artist whose time has finally come.” Deadline’s takeaway: For a musical devoted to trumpeting the new and daring, Lempicka can feel decidedly backward-looking. That’s not a bad thing when those glance-backs include vivid flashes of Art Deco elegance, invigorating ’90s dance pop, big time Evita belting and a dash or two of One Night in Bangkok‘s jaunty decadence.
A pop bio-musical written by Carson Kreitzer and Matt Gould about the groundbreaking Art Deco painter Tamara de Lempicka, Lempicka follows the artist through such 20th Century milestones as the Russian Revolution, two World Wars, the tragic slide of Jazz Age Paree to Nazi-occupied Paris, and, for a few brief moments, a lonely 1970s Los Angeles.
Actually, the musical doesn’t so much follow the artist as latches on for a ride that’s both thrilling and tiring. Directed by the ever-inventive Rachel Chavkin, with a powerhouse Eden Espinosa (Wicked) in the title role, Lempicka offers up a tempting mix of retro-futurism and just plain retro, with choreography (by Raja Feather Kelly), scenic design (Riccardo Hernández) and costumes (Paloma Young) that work hard to convey the Zelig-like scope of the artist’s life. That means we see, along with some sumptuous Deco-heavy visuals, lots of energetic dancing that frequently cribs from the most arresting of “Vogue”-era Madonna (fair is fair: Blond Ambition was a Lempicka painting come to life). At its worst, though, the dancing leads the musical through some very cartoony presentations of Soviet Realism and Left Bank bohemianism.
Though the musical’s book and lyrics remain doggedly by-the-numbers, Chavkin’s direction (and a good cast that includes Andrew Samonsky, Amber Iman, George Abud, Beth Leavel and Natalie Joy Johnson) keeps Lempicka barreling through the last century’s wartime horrors, peacetime optimism and an art that grew from both.
The Outsiders
(L-R) Jason Schmidt and Brody Grant in ‘The Outsiders’
Matthew Murphy
Opening night: April 11, 2024 Venue: Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre Director: Danya Taymor Book: Adam Rapp, Justin Levine Music and lyrics: Jamestown Revival (Jonathan Clay & Zach Chance) and Justin Levine Choreography: Rick Kuperman & Jeff Kuperman Cast: Brody Grant, Sky Lakota-Lynch, Joshua Boone, Brent Comer, Jason Schmidt, Emma Pittman, Daryl Tofa, Kevin William Paul and Dan Berry, with Jordan Chin, Milena J. Comeau, Barton Cowperthwaite, Tilly Evans-Krueger, Henry Julián Gendron, RJ Higton, Wonza Johnson, Sean Harrison Jones, Maggie Kuntz, Renni Anthony Magee, SarahGrace Mariani, Melody Rose, Josh Strobl, Victor Carrillo Tracey, Trevor Wayne. Running time: 2 hr 30 min (including intermission) Official synopsis: In Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1967, Ponyboy Curtis, his best friend Johnny Cade and their Greaser family of “outsiders” battle with their affluent rivals, the Socs. This thrilling new Broadway musical navigates the complexities of self-discovery as the Greasers dream about who they want to become in a world that may never accept them. With a dynamic original score, The Outsiders is a story of friendship, family, belonging… and the realization that there is still “lots of good in the world.” Deadline’s takeaway: A fine and catchy score that references pop, early rock & roll, country and showtune balladeering is performed by a terrific young cast in Broadway’s The Outsiders, opening in a heartfelt production at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre.
If you’ve read the book or seen the movie, you know the story. The musical’s book by Adam Rapp with Justin Levine stays close to its origins for better and worse, and the songs by the excellent folk and Americana duo Jamestown Revival, along with Levine, go a long way to fill in plot details and character histories.
Still, even with clever direction by Danya Taymor, The Outsiders never quite outgrows its Young Adult literary origins. Based on the groundbreaking S.E. Hinton novel and Francis Ford Coppola’s film adaptation, The Outsiders often comes across as a precocious teen all dressed up for a night on the New York town — clearly money has been spent on a spare, efficient set, with lots of stacked tires and planks of wood, designed by AMP featuring Tatiana Kahvegian, enhanced by Hana S. Kim’s cool projections (in one case, literally — images of Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke are, if nothing else, an easy time-placer). The full talents of the designers and special effects masters come together in a terrific barn fire scene, and Brian MacDevitt’s lighting design and Cody Spencer’s sound meld well with with the choreography, especially during a crowd-pleasing slo-mo, freeze-frame, strobe-lit rumble between the vengeance-seeking cliques.
While all the production’s elements seem to be in place — the cast, even when its acting chops falter, is, musically, a full-throated and easy-to-like ensemble — The Outsiders often feels like a musical that wants to hang with the grown-ups while unable to leave behind its adolescent earnestness and self-involvement. A more thoughtfully adult production might invent some credible consequences for a negligent, deadly arson, a fatal stabbing and a train derailment, all of which are presented, true to S.E. Hinton, as temporary glitches in the self-actualization of a 14-year-old boy.
Opening night: March 28, 2024 Venue: Nederlander Theatre Director: Des McAnuff Book: Pete Townshend and Des McAnuff Music and lyrics: Pete Townshend Choreography: Lorin Latarro Cast: Ali Louis Bourzgui, Alison Luff, Adam Jacobs, John Ambrosino, Bobby Conte, Christina Sajous, with Haley Gustafson, Jeremiah Alsop, Ronnie S. Bowman Jr., Mike Cannon, Tyler James Eisenreich, Sheldon Henry, Afra Hines, Aliah James, David Paul Kidder, Tassy Kirbas, Lily Kren, Quinten Kusheba, Reese Levine, Brett Michael Lockley, Nathan Lucrezio, Alexandra Matteo, Mark Mitrano, Reagan Pender, Cecilia Ann Popp, Daniel Quadrino, Olive Ross-Kline, Jenna Nicole Schoen, Dee Tomasetta, and Andrew Tufano. Running time: 2 hr 10 min (including intermission) Deadline’s takeaway:The Who’s Tommy is a nonstop surge of electrified energy, a darting pinball of a production that syncs visual panache with 55-year-old songs that sound as vital today as they must have at Woodstock. To read full review, click on show title above.
Opening night: March 21, 2024 Venue: Imperial Theatre Director: Jessica Stone Book: Rick Elice, based on the novel by Sara Gruen Music and lyrics: Pigpen Theatre Company Cast: Grant Gustin, Isabelle McCalla, Gregg Edelman, Paul Alexander Nolan, Stan Brown, Joe De Paul, Sara Gettelfinger and Wade McCollum, with Brandon Block, Antoine Boissereau, Rachael Boyd, Paul Castree, Ken Wulf Clark, Taylor Colleton, Gabriel Olivera de Paula Costa, Isabella Luisa Diaz, Samantha Gershman, Keaton Hentoff-Killian, Nicolas Jelmoni, Caroline Kane, Harley Ross Beckwith McLeish, Michael Mendez, Samuel Renaud, Marissa Rosen, Alexandra Gaelle Royer, Asa Somers, Charles South, Sean Stack, Matthew Varvar and Michelle West Running time: 2 hr 40 min (including intermission) Deadline’s takeaway:Water for Elephants is a pleasant, visually beguiling show with a cast led by The Flash‘s Grant Gustin in a sweet-voiced Broadway debut that puts some charm into a thin book by Rick Elice that probably veered too close to the novel for its own good. To read full review, click on show title above.
Opening night: March 18, 2024 Venue: Circle in the Square Written by: Henrik Ibsen, In A New Version By Amy Herzog Directed by: Sam Gold Cast: Jeremy Strong, Michael Imperioli, Victoria Pedretti, Katie Broad, Bill Buell, Caleb Eberhardt, Matthew August Jeffers, David Patrick Kelly, David Mattar Merten, Max Roll, Thomas Jay Ryan, Alan Trong Running time: 2 hrs (including one pause) Deadline’s takeaway: Watching Jeremy Strong (Succession) and Michael Imperioli (The Sopranos) go head to head for two hours is a treat, as if the stars of your favorite HBO dramas had crossed over some crazy timeline to show each other what for. To read full review, click on show title above.
Opening night: March 14, 2024 Venue: Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre Directors: Michael Greif and Schele Williams Book: Bekah Brunstetter Music and lyrics: Ingrid Michaelson Cast: Jordan Tyson, Joy Woods, Maryann Plunkett, John Cardoza, Ryan Vasquez, Dorian Harewood, with Andréa Burns, Yassmin Alers, Alex Benoit, Chase Del Rey, Hillary Fisher, Jerome Harmann-Hardeman, Dorcas Leung, Happy McPartlin, Juliette Ojeda, Kim Onah, Carson Stewart, Charles E. Wallace, Charlie Webb Running time: 2 hr 10 min (including intermission) Deadline’s takeaway: Based on Nicholas Sparks’ 1996 bestseller about a young — then older, then much older — couple who survives a lifetime of tribulations (until they don’t), The Notebook is the theatrical equivalent of Muzak, comforting in its unapologetically manipulative way and unabashed in its disregard for anything approaching the grit of the real world. To read full review, click on show title above.
Opening night: March 7, 2024 Venue: Todd Haimes Theatre Written by: John Patrick Shanley Directed by: Scott Ellis Cast: Amy Ryan, Liev Schreiber, Zoe Kazan, Quincy Tyler Bernstine Running time: 90 min (no intermission) Deadline’s takeaway: That the play holds up as well as it does since its 2004 premiere — and it really does — is due in large part to a top-tier cast that the Roundabout Theater Company has assembled, an ensemble that keeps us guessing from beginning to end. To read full review, click on show title above.
The Regional Transportation District’s E and H line light rail trains will not operate on their regular routes from Tuesday, April 23 to Thursday, April 25 due to maintenance, according to an RTD news release.
E Line service will run as normal between I-25/Broadway and Union Station and at 30-minute intervals between Colorado Station and RidgeGate Parkway Station while RTD replaces overhead wires at the Louisiana/Pearl Station beginning April 23.
The H Line will run at 30-minute intervals between Colorado and Florida stations and will not run north of Colorado Station. Customers can transfer to the D Line to travel to central downtown.
Temporary bus shuttle service will be offered between I-25/Broadway and Colorado stations. Customers can board the buses at Colorado Station, gate C, University of Denver Station, gate B, Louisiana/Pearl Station, gate A2, and I-25/Broadway Station, gate A2.
Louis Gossett Jr., the tough guy with a sensitive side who won an Oscar for his portrayal of a steely sergeant in An Officer and a Gentleman and an Emmy for his performance as a compassionate slave in the landmark miniseries Roots, has died. He was 87.
Gossett’s first cousin Neal L. Gossett told the Associated Press that the actor died Thursday night in Santa Monica. The cause of death is unknown, but Gossett announced in 2010 that he had prostate cancer.
With his sleek, bald pate and athlete’s physique, Gossett was intimidating in a wide array of no-nonsense roles, most notably in Taylor Hackford’s Officer and a Gentleman (1982), where as Gunnery Sgt. Emil Foley he rides Richard Gere’s character mercilessly (but for his own good) at an officer candidate school and gets into a memorable martial arts fight.
He was the second Black man to win an acting Oscar, following Sidney Poitier in 1964.
For the role, the 6-foot-4 Gossett trained for 30 days at the Marine Corps Recruitment Division, an adjunct of Camp Pendleton north of San Diego. “I knew I had to put myself through at least some degree of this all-encompassing transformation,” Gossett wrote in his 2010 biography, An Actor and a Gentleman.
Douglas Day Stewart’s original script called for Gere’s Zack Mayo to beat up Foley.
“The Marines changed it,” Gossett recalled in a 2010 interview. “They said that an enlisted man would never beat up a drill sergeant. We’ll tear the place up unless you change it. They said, ‘If you don’t do this well, Mr. Gossett, we’re going to have to kill you.’ “
The Brooklyn native capitalized on this hard-ass image in such action films as The Punisher (1989), opposite Dolph Lundgren, and Iron Eagle (1986) and its three sequels. In the Iron Eagle series, he starred as Col. Charles “Chappy” Sinclair, a leader of dangerous rescue missions in threatening international locales.
In 1959, Gossett played George Murchison in the original Broadway production of Lorraine Hansberry’s domestic tragedy A Raisin in the Sun, then segued to Daniel Petrie’s 1961 Columbia film adaptation along with his stage co-stars Poitier and Ruby Dee, launching his career in Hollywood.
It was his eloquent portrayal as Fiddler, an older slave who teaches a young Kunta Kinte (LeVar Burton) to speak English on the eight-part ABC miniseries Roots, that earned him his first significant dose of national recognition. Eighty-five percent of the U.S. population tuned in for at least a portion of Roots, and the finale drew more than 100 million viewers in January 1977.
“All the top African-American actors were asked, and I begged to be in there,” Gossett once said. “I got the best role, I think. It was wonderful.”
Gossett also starred in the critically acclaimed telefilm Sadat (1983), in which he played the assassinated Egyptian leader (Sadat’s widow, Jehan, personally chose him for the part), and he portrayed a baseball immortal in Don’t Look Back: The Story of Leroy “Satchel” Paige in a 1981 telefilm.
During his 60-year-plus career, Gossett excelled in a number of non-stereotypical racial roles, playing a hospital chief of staff on the 1979 ABC series The Lazarus Syndrome and the title character Gideon Oliver, an anthropology professor, on a 1989 set of ABC Mystery Movies.
He also appeared as the guardian of a 16-year-old alien (Peter Barton) on NBC’s The Powers of Matthew Star; as Gerak, the first leader of the Free Jaffa Nation, on the Syfy series Stargate SG-1; as Halle Berry‘s estranged father on CBS’ Extant; and asformer vigilanteWill Reeves on HBO’s Watchmen. (That last one resulted in his eighth career Emmy nom.)
Gossett was born on May 27, 1936, in the melting pot of Brooklyn, the son of a porter (who was adopted and raised by an Italian family) and a maid. At Abraham Lincoln High School, he was class president and starred on the baseball, track and basketball teams; later, he would be invited to the New York Knicks’ rookie camp.
When a leg injury forced him to sit out one high school basketball season, Gossett developed an interest in acting, and his English teacher recommended him to the producers of the 1953 Broadway show Take a Giant Step. He won the lead role at age 17 over more than 400 other contenders, then received the Donaldson Award for newcomer of the year.
Gossett accepted a dramatics scholarship to NYU, became pals with James Dean at the Actors Studio in New York and made his onscreen debut in 1957 on the NBC anthology series The Big Story.
In 1964, he, Lola Falana and Mae Barnes sang in the cast of America, Be Seated, a “modern minstrel show” that was produced by Mike Todd Jr. and played at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York.
Two years later, he co-wrote the antiwar song “Handsome Johnny” for Richie Havens’ first album, a tune the folk legend performed as the opening act at Woodstock three years later.
Gossett went on to play an angry man living in a run-down apartment building in Hal Ashby’s The Landlord (1970), a con artist opposite James Garner in the slavery-era Skin Game (1971), a drug-dealing cutthroat in The Deep (1977), a headmaster in Toy Soldiers (1991) and a down-and-out boxer in Diggstown (1992).
The actor’s film résumé also included Travels With My Aunt (1972), The Laughing Policeman (1973), The River Niger (1976), The Choirboys (1977), Enemy Mine (1985), The Principal (1987), Blue Chips (1994), Jasper, Texas (2003), Daddy’s Little Girls (2007), King of the Dancehall (2016), Foster Boy (2018), The Cuban (2019) and The Color Purple (2023).
Gossett also did excellent work in The Sentry Collection Presents Ben Vereen: His Roots; Backstairs at the White House; Palmerstown, U.S.A.; A Gathering of Old Men; and Touched by an Angel. He received an Emmy nom for each of these five projects.
As a producer, he shared a Daytime Emmy for the 1998 children’s special In His Father’s Shoes, in which he also starred.
He was active in the New York Alumni Association, a group of Big Apple emigrants who for more than two decades reunited each year for a show at Beverly Hills High School.
In 2006, Gossett founded the nonprofit Eracism Foundation, an “all out conscious offensive” to eradicate all forms of racism by providing programs that foster cultural diversity, historical enrichment, education and antiviolence initiatives. (In the 1966, he said he was pulled over by Beverly Hills cops and handcuffed to a palm tree for no reason.)
“We better take care of ourselves and one another better, otherwise nobody’s gonna win anything,” he said in July 2020 during a CBS Sunday Morning profile. “We need each other quite desperately — for our mutual salvation.”
“Music is a gift, and has a power to crystallize a moment,” said a breathless Patti LuPone on Saturday night, moments after sweeping onto the Eisemann Center’s Hill Performance Hall stage, on the receiving end of the first of many standing ovations. “This is my life in music — so far.”…
Joy Woods and Ryan Vasquez as ‘Middle Allie’ and ‘Middle Noah’ in ‘The Notebook’ on Broadway. Copyright 2024 Julieta Cervantes
The Notebook | 2hrs 20mins. One intermission. | Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre | 236 West 45th Street | (212) 239-6200
Why are Broadway musicals suddenly so lousy? Many reasons, I can safely assume: geniuses die, leaving a hole in history with no one to replace them; teams of amateur hacks are everywhere, filling gaps once occupied by Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, Oscar Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Rodgers and Hart, Lerner and Loewe, and Comden and Green; considering the garbage they listen to every day, it’s no wonder wanna-be songwriters couldn’t write a memorable melody or an intelligent lyric line with a gun to their heads; clueless producers with no taste plunk down plenty of money to finance projects without a hope in hell of commercial success. Nobody has written a classic musical score with any originality and style since the death of Stephen Sondheim.
After his lovely and haunting Light in the Piazza, I had high hopes for Adam Guettel, but this season’s flop, The Days of Wine and Roses, proves the rumor that he spends every waking moment thinking of ways to avoid any comparison to his illustrious grandfather, the one and only Richard Rodgers. So what we’re getting instead of fresh, original musicals is increasingly forgettable carbons of old movies. The newest disappointments are The Notebook and Water for Elephants, a pair of gooey, predictable and temporary tearjerkers based on two of those corny romance novels cut from the same fabric as The Bridges of Madison County that teenagers drag to the beach with a nickel pack of Kleenex.
More about Water for Elephants next week, but first The Notebook, saccharine fiction by Nicholas Sparks that found its way into an inevitable 2004 movie that shamelessly poured on more schmaltz as it chronicled events in the labored story of Allie and Noah, a pair of lovers who survive endless pitfalls for five decades and still love each other long after mutual devotion has been invaded by personal tragedy. The movie tells the story of their saga through the eyes of two separate versions of Allie and Noah, who are of different ages. The device was annoying, but I remember enjoying it anyway. With older Allie and Noah played by ravishing Gena Rowlands and charming James Garner, and younger Allie and Noah played by beautiful Rachel McAdams and handsome newcomer Ryan Gosling before he became a Ken doll, what’s not to like?
Maryann Plunkett (left), Joy Woods (center) and Jordan Tyson (right) as Allie in ‘The Notebook’ on Broadway. Copyright 2024 Julieta Cervantes
The choppy, overwrought new Broadway production turns Allie and Noah into three couples instead of two, and every time they waft in and out of each other’s story, their races change along with their genders. The old Allie is now an elderly blonde in a nursing home suffering from dementia, and the old Noah, who seems years her senior, is black. She doesn’t know if he’s the janitor or a fellow patient, but one thing she never suspects is that he’s been her husband for 54 years. Cut to two periods in their youth, and the two Allies are suddenly black, and their Noahs are white. They all sing loud, which is not the same thing as good, but to no effect because the score is so forgettable that the songs seem to be inserted for the sole purpose of dragging out the running time. To make everything doubly confusing, old Allie doesn’t know who anyone is, including herself. From the baffled comments overheard during intermission, the audience didn’t seem to know, either. It is doubtful that half the audience knew all those people they were watching were playing the same two characters.
Before Noah can rehabilitate Allie and bring her back to normal, he has a stroke and now there are two lovers in terminal danger. No mention is made of the interracial pairings, so it is unfair to dwell on that aspect of the confusion, but when all six Allies and Noahs sing together, chaos reigns. What worked on the screen in a lugubrious, long-winded way doesn’t work on the stage at all. Both Ingrid Michaelson, who penned the boring, surface-deep songs, and Bekah Brunstetter, who wrote the shallow, sentimental book, are making their Broadway debuts, and the lack of experience shows. The badly needed element of poignancy to add depth to cardboard characters is nowhere in sight.
The cast of ‘The Notebook’ on Broadway. Copyright 2024 Julieta Cervantes
This a shame because Maryann Plunkett and Dorian Harewood, who play Older Allie and Older Noah, are engaging pros who deserve a better showcase. I was especially excited to see Harewood in a leading role that guaranteed Broadway stardom at last. I once shared the stage with him in one of those all-star AIDS benefits in Hollywood that showcased the historic songs of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe and he sang a heartbreaking arrangement of “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face” and “Gigi” I have never forgotten. I thought the stardom that had unfairly eluded him in the past would finally happen at last when he co-starred in the 1974 Broadway musical Miss Moffat, the musical version of The Corn is Green, starring the one and only Bette Davis. Alas, it closed in previews.
Now, here he is, at last, excellent as always but woefully denied any kind of show-stopping number you could confidently call memorable. This is the fate of the entire cast, unexceptionally choreographed by Katie Spelman and directed with mediocrity (there’s that over-riding keyword again) by Schele Williams, both of whom are also making their soggy Broadway debuts. Michael Greif, curiously listed as a second director for reasons known only to the producers, has done fine work elsewhere, but in The Notebook, he doesn’t appear to do much more than move the actors from one dark part of a room into the next, like furniture.
The result is a shallow, boring and totally irresolute The Notebook that crawls at a snail’s pace.
Listen up, everyone! There will be no more mention of Tom Sandoval while Ariana Madix is on Broadway!
While fans eagerly waited to meet the 38-year-old cocktail book author outside of the stage door at New York City’s Ambassador Theatre this week, where she is currently starring as Roxie Hart in Chicago, one of the security guards laid down an important ground rule. What was it, you may ask? No one can mention her cheating ex at any point! As seen in a video posted on Instagram, he said:
“Y’all fans of Ariana, right? Please don’t mention her ex at all. He’s irrelevant. Thank you.”
Fans applauded the security guard. Some even insisted they would “never” bring up Sandoval. Watch the video (below):
OMG!
Is this a permanent rule? Or was this guy just making a joke? If Ariana really did ask for fans not to mention Tom at the stage door, we wouldn’t blame her! No one wants to be reminded of their ex every single second of the day. And we can imagine folks at the post-show stage door have bombarded her with questions and comments about Scandoval ever since she started her run in January!
Whelp, you’ve been warned! Moving forward, anyone who attends Chicago and waits outside the venue to meet the cast don’t bring up Sandoval! Reactions, Perezcious readers? Drop them in the comments below.
Amy Ryan, Zoe Kazan, Liev Schreiber in Roundabout Theatre Company’s new Broadway production of Doubt. Joan Marcus
Doubt | 1hr 30mins. No intermission. | Todd Haimes Theatre | 227 West 42nd Street | 212-719-1300
“Credo quia absurdum,” goes a declaration derived from early Christian apologist Tertullian: “I believe because it is absurd.” The more outlandish the claim the tighter one’s fingers curl around the rosary beads. Faith should negate the need for evidence or trial; proof of the divine would, paradoxically, diminish faith and lead believers into heresy. One might even argue that miracles are cheating (likewise theology, the pseudo-science of the imaginary). That terrible gap between inner conviction and outward facticity is a fiery chasm running down the middle of Doubt, currently in an impressive revival at the Roundabout.
What gives John Patrick Shanley’s 2004 “parable” its dramatic charge is how very un-absurd the crime that Sister Aloysius (Amy Ryan) suspects Father Flynn (Liev Schreiber) has committed: grooming a boy. It’s 1964 and Donald Muller is the first Black student at the Bronx Catholic school she runs. Aloysius knows all too well what the world has come to realize: the Church protects its predators, who are legion. When guileless young Sister James (Zoe Kazan) reports to Aloysius that Donald returned to class after a private meeting with Flynn behaving oddly and with alcohol on his breath, we, like Aloysius, assume the worst.
Liev Schreiber and Zoe Kazan in Doubt. Joan Marcus
Who is Father Flynn? An avatar of Vatican II’s welcoming embrace of modernity who keeps his nails a bit long and believes children need love, not ruthless discipline—as Aloysius would have it. Shanley gives Flynn the first word in a stirring sermon on the subject of, yes, doubt. How uncertainty in our most trying times may be torture, but also connects us as humans—all of us stumbling in darkness. Dogmatism is dehumanizing. In Schreiber’s physically imposing but strangely soothing presence, you soon forget that he’s about twenty years too old for Flynn (who’s in his late thirties) and simply marvel when this magnetic stage animal furrows his brow or shifts his weight from left to right, sending ripples of tension across a room. Schreiber is an actor of tremendous economy and focus, a marked contrast to the 2004 Flynn (the more boyish and vulnerable Brían F. O’Byrne); he’s unnervingly seductive, manly, authoritative. The pleasure lies in watching that pugilist bulk bowed under Aloysius’ sustained assault.
If Schreiber presents a more menacing Flynn, Ryan does something opposite. Twenty years ago, Cherry Jones’s Aloysius was a monolith of frosty glares, curt retorts and sheer willpower. She was one tough nun on a moral crusade. Indeed, Aloysius is an open invitation for any actress to play a bonneted dragon lady, impregnable to softer emotions. Ryan modulates her portrayal with little touches of sweetness and hesitancy that Jones avoided. This is a more traditionally feminine portrayal, even if Ryan’s armor grows thicker as her path to justice twists and dips. Ryan’s shading pays off, however, in the sickening swerve of a finale, in which Aloysius realizes her victory may have paved the way for more wrongdoing. Confessing uncertainty, she crumbles, sobbing, into James’s arms (Jones was more restrained).
Amy Ryan and Quincy Tyler Bernstine in Doubt. CREDIT: Joan Marcus, 2024
Not only is Doubt in the top ten American dramas of this century, but Sister Aloysius is one of the greatest stage characters in decades. From her pinched lips Shanley issues forth a series of chiseled, moralizing epigrams—Wilde by way of Savonarola. “Satisfaction is vice,” she informs the timorous James. “Innocence is a form of laziness.” “When you take a step to address wrongdoing, you are taking a step away from God, but in His service.” When James recoils from the thought of confronting Flynn on his suspected perversions, Aloysius assumes the haughty tones of a Holmes correcting a squeamish Watson: “Do not indulge yourself in witless adolescent scruples. I assure you I would prefer a more seasoned confederate. But you are the one who came to me.”
Scott Ellis’s faithful (excuse the term) and beautifully designed revival is the inaugural production at the Roundabout’s rechristened Todd Haimes Theatre, named after the late, long-serving artistic director. One of Haimes’s legacies was the casting of first (or second) tier TV and movie celebrities, a policy that might have brought in audiences but wasn’t always best for the art. (Originally, Tyne Daly was cast as Aloysius, but had to leave for medical reasons.) I’m happy to say that the casting here is mostly spot on (Kazan lays on the awkward geek-girl shtick a bit thick). She only gets one scene, but the wry, incisive Quincy Tyler Bernstine is achingly effective as Donald’s long-suffering mother, determined her son will get to high school and escape the abusive household.
Chronologically smack in the middle of his career (thus far) Doubt is Shanley’s finest work, a modern fable that’s less concerned with sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, per se, than the mental prisons that render us both inmate and warden. An expert design team reinforces this carceral motif: David Rockwell’s glowering, Gothic Revival architecture, Kenneth Posner’s dance of autumnal light and shadow, the ominous croaking of crows in Mikaal Sulaiman’s sound, and Linda Cho’s drab but textured habits and vestments. Classically balanced, fiendishly focused, lean and eloquent, the play keeps you guessing until that shocking ending—and still withholds the truth.
Also unexpected, from Shanley: Doubt is not an urban love story or whimsical mediation on the courtship rituals of men and women. Let me qualify that last point. Doubt is very much about female agency in a male-dominated institution, and how, while trying to fight an injustice you know is real, you may perpetuate evil. It would be absurd if it weren’t so tragic.
Broadway’s “Book of Mormon” takes a mission trip to find comedy converts at D.C.’s National Theatre.
WTOP’s Jason Fraley previews ‘The Book of Mormon’ at National Theatre (Part 1)
Sam Nackman and Sam McLellan star in the North American tour of “The Book of Mormon.” (Courtesy Julieta Cervantes)
Sam Nackman and Sam McLellan star in the North American tour of “The Book of Mormon.” (Courtesy Julieta Cervantes)
From “South Park” to “Orgazmo” to “Team America: World Police,” few entertainment minds have brilliantly walked the line of raunchy lowbrow humor and highbrow social commentary better than Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
Their most incredible feat just might have been winning nine Tony Awards, including Best Musical, for mixing poop jokes and religious freedom in “The Book of Mormon,” which hits the National Theatre in D.C. from March 5-17.
“It definitely is sort of ridiculous for them to have found so much success on the Broadway stage, but at the same time, it makes so much sense,” actor Sam McLellan told WTOP.
“Their comedy, while it can feel very lowbrow at moments, it’s actually very intelligent. They come from a perspective that’s very mature and understanding of cultural hot-button issues. They know how to toe the line — and cross it when necessary to make a point.”
McLellan plays self-centered Mormon missionary Elder Price, who leaves Utah with his fibbing sidekick Elder Cunningham (Sam Nackman) on a mission trip to Uganda to win converts to the religion of Joseph Smith.
There’s one problem: The deeply impoverished natives doubt God’s existence. When the idealistic Nabulungi (Berlande) dreams of moving to Sal Tlay Ka Siti (Salt Lake City), the missionaries finally have a chance to spread the word.
“The show is about a pair of mismatched missionaries, one of them super serious and dedicated, the other is really socially awkward but well meaning,” McLellan said.
“My Elder Cunningham is Sam Nackman. The dude is awesome. He’s so funny, he fits the role so perfectly. … When I met him, I was like, ‘This dude is real-life Elder Cunningham,’ but in the best way possible. He’s ridiculous, he’s hilarious, he just oozes comedy in every ounce of his being.”
After writing musical numbers for “South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut” (1999), Parker and Stone teamed with Oscar-winning songwriter Robert Lopez (“Frozen”) for a Tony-winning songbook that includes clever word plays (“Tomorrow is a Latter Day”), hilarious analogies (“Baptize Me” which equates baptism with losing one’s virginity) and dream sequences (“Spooky Mormon Hell” which weaves our deepest fears of Hitler, Genghis Khan and Jeffrey Dahmer).
“Numbers that really are huge for me are ‘You and Me (But Mostly Me)’ and ‘I Believe.’ Those numbers are not only funny as touted, they are just really masterclass songs,” McLellan said.
“Bobby Lopez is a genius on those keys. He writes some of the most interesting and hilarious music that is an homage to some musical theater songs that people know really well. He balances spoofing classical musical theater as well as making it very unique.”
We won’t spoil the meaning of the “Hakuna Matata” spoof “Hasa Diga Eebowai,” but let’s just say it all builds to a jaw-dropping “play within a play.”
While “The King & I” saw the people of Siam stage a performance of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” “The Book of Mormon” has the Ugandan people stage a warped, alternate take on The Book of Mormon.
“It’s hilarious, it’s ridiculous, people scream, people laugh, people cry,” McLellan said.
“I get messages from people all the time after seeing the show just being like, ‘My cheeks hurt. I haven’t laughed that hard since I was a kid.’ It really is so funny. … There’s so many layers to the comedy of the production that aren’t even revealed until you’ve seen the show multiple times. It’s so dense, it’s so hilarious, every moment there’s something funny happening.”
From Marty McFly and Doc Brown to Mrs. Peacock and Col. Mustard, the Durham Performing Arts Center’s 2024-25 Truist Broadway season features some new takes on iconic characters.
“Back to the Future: The Musical,” “Clue” and “The Wiz” are all coming to Durham, along with the Tony Award-winning “Shucked” and “Some Like it Hot.” DPAC announced the new line up Saturday.
Here is a look at the schedule, according to the news release.
▪ “Clue,” Sept. 3-8. Based on the classic board game and 1985 movie, the comedy dives into murder and blackmail as it explores whether it was Mrs. Peacock in the study with the knife or Col. Mustard in the library with the wrench.
▪ “& Juliet,” Oct. 1-6. Written by one of the writers from the Emmy-winning series “Schitt’s Creek,” the new musical and romantic comedy explores what would happen if Juliet didn’t kill herself after finding Romeo dead.
▪ “A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical,” Jan. 7-12, 2025. Created in collaboration with Neil Diamond, the musical tells the true story of how Diamond went from a kid in Brooklyn to an American rock icon.
▪ “Shucked,” March 4-9, 2025. A Tony Award-winning musical comedy that involves corn and the “battle for the heart and soul of a small town,” according to the musical’s website.
▪ “Kimberly Akimbo,” April 29-May 4, 2025. The new musical comedy is about a 16-year-old determined to find happiness while facing multiple challenges. It has won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical.
▪ “Back to the Future: The Musical.” May 20-25, 2025. Creators of the “Back to the Future” movies bring Marty McFly and Doc Brown’s epic, 1985 science-fiction adventure to the stage.
▪ “Some Like it Hot,” June 17-22, 2025. Winner of four Tony Awards, the musical follows two musicians forced to flee Prohibition-era Chicago after witnessing a mob hit.
▪ “The Wiz,” Aug. 5-10, 2025. The musical returns to the stage in the first Broadway tour in 40 years with a new adaptation on the soulful twist on “The Wizard of Oz.”
How to get DPAC tickets
DPAC is currently only selling season tickets for the 2024-25 season, the release states. Tickets to individual shows go on sale later in the season.
DPAC, which seats about 2,700, is owned by the city of Durham but managed by Nederlander and Professional Facilities management.
Tasha Lawrence, Uly Schlesinger, and David Cromer in The Animal KingdomEmilio Madrid
You might recognize the title of The Animal Kingdom from the 1930s Philip Barry comedy of manners about a man trying to justify his love for both his wife and his mistress. Well, forget it. That is emphatically not TheAnimal Kingdom which restlessly inhabits the Connelly Theater these days.
This new Animal Kingdom—by British TV writer Ruby Thomas, imported to these shores by producer-director Jack Serio—has a man, Tim (played by David Cromer), who resolved that quaint wife/mistress quandary years ago. He married the mistress and started a new family, only to dragged back into therapy sessions with the family he left behind: his logorrheic wife Rita (Tasha Lawrence), his ignored daughter Sofia (Lily McInerny), and his anguished son Sam (Uly Schlesinger), fresh from a suicide attempt that brought on this forced “reunion.” A zoology major in college, Sam sees the women in his home as bonobos and his emotionally pent-up dad as a hippopotamus with a submerged, slow-beating heart—thus, evidently, an animal kingdom.
“Sam understands the animal world,” Cromer tells Observer, “but can’t manage the human world.”
There is much to unpack here, and it’s handled with remarkable compassion and patience by a soft-spoken psychotherapist, Daniel (Calvin Leon Smith), who does all he can in six sessions.
Like Austin Pendleton and Joe Mantello, Cromer is a hyperactive hyphenate—a theatrical professional who wears two interchangeable hats: one for acting, and one for directing.
“I like it very much,” he says. “I’ve a complicated relationship to acting. Acting’s something I cared about very much when I was young, and I don’t think I spent the intervening years owning it. I’ve gone back to it a few times and, mostly, just encountered my own limitations, but I always come back to the idea that it’s an interesting challenge. It’s interesting to go on the other side. I learn more about directing while acting and more about acting while directing.”
It can get “a little overwhelming.” But, he adds, “I guess I like the idea that if your brain’s working that hard all the time on a bunch of problems—it keeps you limber, and it keeps your brain agile.”
Actor and director David Cromer. Courtesy of David Cromer
That professional duality has followed him since he reached New York from his native Chicago. Early on, he staged the longest run Thornton Wilder’s Our Town ever got(one directorial flourish: it was the first time Emily smelled breakfast bacon when she returned for her 12th birthday). He also acted the Stage Manager, soliciting audience questions about his community.
Almost 20 years later, The Animal Kingdom continues his two-hatted tradition. He found—or made—time to play the bottled-up dad trying to make belated amends for his family failings.
“Tim still has a very close relationship with all of them. It’s not a warm relationship because he’s not that kind of person. It is recognizable to me in my relationship with my own family, my relationship with my father, my father’s relationship to me. I feel like my dad in this, and I feel like I was Sam when I was young and my dad was Tim. There’s a point where you don’t get what your children are like. For someone who is as emotional and as volatile as Sam, that would be really difficult to Tim. He loves his kids. I don’t think he likes them to the extent he’s capable.
“The time I spend in the play, I gather that I have served my family poorly. I admit it. I say I’ve been a bad father. I didn’t learn how to do it. That’s not an excuse. I’m trying to be different with Elsie, who is his new child with his second wife. I’m trying to be better, but I can’t go back.”
This role materialized just when Cromer was locked into two important projects as a director.
Molly Ranson, Francis Benhamou, Nael Nacer, Aria Shahghasemi, Betsy Aidem, and Anthony Edward (from left) in Prayer for the French Republic. Jeremy Daniel
First, he had to ready his Off-Broadway hit, Joshua Harmon’s Prayer for the French Republic, for Broadway and Tony consideration. “Remounting is always an opportunity to upgrade how we executed things and how safe it is to revisit all our choices,” Cromer admits. “We were trying to do something that is very like a Broadway play on an Off-Broadway schedule. The play is very ambitious in its scope and in its length. Josh did a little shaping, but he didn’t change much.
“I thought very differently about the sound and the music than I did before. We had the chance to explore low-lighting in a richer way than we did in a smaller space with fewer resources.”
Before and after performing The Animal Kingdom, Cromer is busying himself with a bizarre project that will reunite him with his Tony-wining teammates from The Band’s Visit, composer David Yazbekand book writer Itamar Moses. It’s called Dead Outlaw, and it starts previews at the Minetta Lane Feb. 28 and opens March 10.
Yazbek, who’s collaborating with Erik Della Pennaon the songs, is the one who stumbled across this true, but decidedly odd, story: a successful alcoholic but failed train-robber, Elmer McCurdy was killed by a sheriff’s posse and embalmed. No one claimed the body, so, in an effort to keep the body, it was embalmed with a lot of arsenic (which was a preservation they used to use in embalming). He was mummified, did not decompose and was displayed for decades. “Come see the famous outlaw!” The body got passed around and shown at various carnivals and traveling shows and museums until eventually people forgot that this was a real person. When they accidentally discover that he was, it is a real showstopper—in several senses of the word.
That’s a lot of balls in the air—plus, Cromer managed to act in a couple of plays getting full-scale productions here later this season: Chekov’s Uncle Vanya and Lucy Prebble’s The Effect.
His presence in The Animal Kingdom he explains in two words: Jack Serio. “I have a really good relationship with him. We did Uncle Vanya together last summer, and we just love to talk about plays. He found this play, and I thought it a beautifully wrought play about attempted suicide.
“My younger brother, Michael, committed suicide in 2015. That’s a specific part of my life, where my brain is, where my understanding of life is, so I found the survival aspect of this story worth doing. I knew I’d be too busy and exhausted, but I really couldn’t walk away from it.”
Tributes are continuing to pour in for Broadway legend Chita Rivera, known for bringing to life some of theater’s most classic roles like Anita in “West Side Story” and Velma Kelly in “Chicago.” Rivera died Tuesday at age 91. CBS News’ Vlad Duthiers reflects on her decades-long career.
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NEW YORK (WABC) — From Broadway and Hollywood stars to local politicians, tributes are pouring in following the death of revered and pioneering Tony-winning dancer and singer, Chita Rivera.
Rivera’s death was announced by her daughter, Lisa Mordente, who said she died Tuesday in New York after a brief illness.
The dynamic dancer, singer and actor who garnered 10 Tony nominations, winning twice, during a long Broadway career that forged a path for Latina artists, died at the age of 91.
Unsurprisingly, her legacy left an indelible mark on the entertainment industry, leading to an outpouring of tributes from stars like ‘Hamilton’s’ Lin-Manuel Miranda and Ariana DeBose.
Broadway legend, Chita Rivera, recently sat down with WABC-TV for an exclusive interview inside the historic Winter Garden Theatre, where she played Anita in the original Broadway production of West Side Story.
“The trailerblazer for P.R., on Broadway. Originated Anita AND Rosie AND Velma Kelly AND The Spider Woman AND so many more iconic Broadway roles because she was an absolute original,” Miranda said in an Instagram post. “My heart is with everyone in Chita’s galaxy of family and friends. We’ll be blasting WSS and Bye Bye Birdie and Chicago and SO MUCH MUSIC, because she left us so much. Gracias, Chita. Alabanza.”
“She was a force. In truth she made me nervous. To be in her presence was to behold greatness. I always got the sense that she had great expectations, but none greater than the ones she held herself to…I am heartbroken and yet ever inspired as she showed so many of us what was possible. Rest well Queen,” DeBose said in an Instagram post.
Actress Rita Moreno, who followed Rivera in playing Anita in ‘West Side Story,’ posted her own touching tribute on Instagram.
“Chita Rivera is eternal. I remember seeing her for the first time in Mr. Wonderful and exclaiming, “Oh my god, who IS that”? When I found out that this astonishing creature was one of my people, I crowed with pride. Over the years, we were sometimes mistaken for each other which I always viewed as a badge of honor. She was the essence of Broadway. As I write this, I am raising a glass to this remarkable woman and friend. Chita, amiga, Salud!”
‘Chicago The Musical’ also posted a tribute on X honoring Rivera, who played the original Velma Kelly, and also played Roxie at a number of locations.
Joe Torres has more on the reaction to Chita Rivera’s death.
“We are heartbroken to learn Chita Rivera has passed away at 91. She was the original Velma Kelly and also played Roxie in Toronto, Las Vegas & London. Chita’s influence, warmth, and other-worldly talent will inspire us always. Tonight’s show is for her.”
The current cast of the musical also paid tribute at the Ambassador Theatre Tuesday night:
“She lives on in our hearts, on this stage, in every performance. We love you Chita. Thank you.”
Here are some other tributes posted in honor of Rivera:
‘Seinfeld’ actor Jason Alexander
“This extraordinary woman, the incomparable. Chita Rivera was one of the greatest spirits and colleagues I’ve ever known. She set the bar in every way. I will cherish her always. Dance in heaven, my friend.”
Actress and singer Kristin Chenoweth
“Chita, There was only you. Then everyone else. I looked up to you and always will admire you as a talent and mostly as a person! A kick butt woman you were. All the rest of us just wanna be you. RIP CHITA.”
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul
“From the Bronx to Broadway, the legendary Chita Rivera lit up every room she was in. She shattered countless glass ceilings, brought joy to theaters across America, and paved a path for the next generation of performers. I send my heartfelt condolences to her family.”
New York Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez
“Chita Rivera was a trailblazer and Broadway legend who took pride in her Puerto Rican heritage and helped pave the way for other Latina artists. My thoughts and prayers are with her family. May she rest in peace.”
Co-author of ‘Chita, A Memoir’ – Patrick Pacheco
Patrick Pacheco, who helped write Rivera’s memoir, ‘Chita, A Memoir,’ says she was grateful for everything she got.
“She wanted more of it because she lived for the stage,” Pacheco said.
CEO Ballet Hispanic – Eduardo Vilar
“We need to continuously sing her praises and make sure she is part of the canon of musical theatre,” said Eduardo Vilar, CEO of Ballet Hispanico. “Put up on that throne she deserves. She’s a queen”
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Broadway icon Chita Rivera, best known for her role as Anita in the original 1957 Broadway cast of “West Side Story,” has died at age 91. Rivera died Tuesday in New York after a brief illness, her daughter said in a statement provided to CBS News.
Rivera, a trailblazer for other Latinas aspiring to the Broadway stage, was honored with 10 Tony nominations and won twice. In 2018, she received a special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatre.
Chita Rivera arrives at the 72nd annual Tony Awards at Radio City Music Hall on June 10, 2018, in New York.
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
Born in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 23, 1933, Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero Montestuco Florentina Carnemacaral del Fuente was one of five siblings. Her father died when she was 7 years old and her mother was left to raise the children on her own.
Rivera trained as a dancer from a young age and won a scholarship to the prestigious School of American Ballet at 16. She also began dancing at Manhattan’s Palladium nightclub, where she later told CBS “Sunday Morning,” “I discovered the rhythm. I discovered the beat. I discovered my heartbeat. I was becoming attuned to my sex appeal. And the rhythm was hot.”
In her 2023 book, “Chita: A Memoir,” Rivera described herself as two people: Chita and Dolores. She said Dolores has a darker side, but “I believe that Dolores is responsible for me having a career. She’s the guts. She’s the courage.”
Rivera harnessed that drive to catapult herself onto the Broadway stage at her time when few Latinas won roles, rising to stardom with her performance in “West Side Story” and going on to star in other hit shows including “Bye Bye Birdie,” “Guys and Dolls,” “Chicago” and “Kiss of the Spider Woman.”
Chita Rivera, an original cast member in the Broadway musical production of “West Side Story,” in November 1957.
AP Photo
Rivera was the first Latina to be awarded Kennedy Center Honors in 2002, which is given to artists for their lifetime contributions in the field of the performing arts. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009 by then-President Barack Obama for her work as an “agent of change.”
On the set of “West Side Story,” she met fellow dancer fellow dancer Tony Mordente; they married and had one daughter, Lisa. Rivera is survived by her daughter Lisa Mordente and three of her siblings Julio, Armando and Lola del Rivero, the statement said.
As news broke of Rivera’s death, condolences and tributes to the Broadway legend poured in on social media.
Rita Moreno, who played Anita in the 1961 film version of “West Side Story,” said she was taken by Rivera the first time she met her and considered it was an honor to be mistaken for being her.
“Chita Rivera is eternal,” Moreno wrote on Instagram. “I remember seeing her for the first time in Mr. Wonderful and exclaiming, ‘Oh my god, who IS that’? When I found out that this astonishing creature was one of my people, I crowed with pride.”
“Over the years, we were sometimes mistaken for each other which I always viewed as a badge of honor,” she continued. “She was the essence of Broadway. As I write this, I am raising a glass to this remarkable woman and friend. Chita, amiga, Salud!”
Actress and singer Kristin Chenoweth said she’d always looked up to Rivera. “There was only you,” she tweeted. “Then everyone else. I looked up to you and always will admire you as a talent and mostly as a person! A kick butt woman you were. All the rest of us just wanna be you. RIP CHITA”
Kristin Chenoweth, Liz Smith, Kitty Carlisle Hart, Bernadette Peters, Joel Grey, Chita Rivera and Bebe Neuwirth at Grey’s birthday party in 2004.
Bruce Glikas/FilmMagic
New York Governor Kathy Hochul praised Rivera’s trailblazing career.
“From the Bronx to Broadway, the legendary Chita Rivera lit up every room she was in,” Hochul wrote. “She shattered countless glass ceilings, brought joy to theaters across America, and paved a path for the next generation of performers. I send my heartfelt condolences to her family.”
Actor Jason Alexander, who starred opposite Rivera in the 1984 musical “The Rink,” said she was one of the best colleagues he’d ever worked alongside.
“This extraordinary woman, the incomparable,” he tweeted. “Chita Rivera was one of the greatest spirits and colleagues I’ve ever known. She set the bar in every way. I will cherish her always. Dance in heaven, my friend. #ripChitaRivera.”
This extraordinary woman, the incomparable. Chita Rivera was one of the greatest spirits and colleagues I’ve ever known. She set the bar in every way. I will cherish her always. Dance in heaven, my friend. #ripChitaRiverapic.twitter.com/mvtvTY1mw9
Actress Mia Farrow also eulogized Rivera on social media, calling her “authentic” and “magnificent.”
“Chita Rivera was an authentic Broadway icon – a dazzling actress, singer and dancer,” she tweeted. “No one who was fortunate enough to have seen any of her performances, will ever forget the experience. She gave us so much. Thank you to the magnificent, irreplaceable Chita Rivera.”
Cara Tabachnick is a news editor and journalist at CBSNews.com. Cara began her career on the crime beat at Newsday. She has written for Marie Claire, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. She reports on justice and human rights issues. Contact her at cara.tabachnick@cbsinteractive.com
Mike Nussbaum, the late-blooming Chicago actor who portrayed the aging salesman George Aaronow in the original Broadway production of Glengarry Glen Ross, just one of his many collaborations with David Mamet, has died. He was 99.
Nussbaum died Saturday — six days shy of his 100th birthday — at his home in Chicago, his daughter, Karen, told the Chicago Sun-Times.
He acted on Windy City stages for more than a half-century and received a lifetime achievement award from the League of Chicago Theaters in 2019.
On the big screen, Nussbaum played the book publisher Bob Drimmer in Fatal Attraction (1987), a school principal in Field of Dreams (1989) and the alien jewelry store owner Gentle Rosenburg in Men in Black (1997).
Nussbaum and Mamet first met in the late 1960s, and the future Pulitzer Prize winner would cast him as Teach in the 1975 premiere of his three-man drama American Buffalo at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. He also played Albert Einstein in Mamet’s Relativity.
He shared a Drama Desk award in 1984 for his turn as Aaronow (Alan Arkin had the role in the 1992 movie adaptation) in Glengarry Glen Ross and was another salesman, Shelley Levene (Jack Lemmon in the film), in another acclaimed run at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre.
“It’s wonderful to work with Mike because, like any artist, like any actor, he’s just unusual,” Mamet said in a 2014 profile of Nussbaum in Chicago magazine. “You’re constantly saying, ‘My God, where did that come from?’ It’s not coming out of a bag of ‘acting moments.’ That’s all bullshit. It’s coming out of — who the hell knows where? You either got it, or you don’t, and Mike certainly does.”
The son of a fur wholesaler, Myron Nussbaum was born on Dec. 29, 1923, and raised in the Albany Park area of Chicago. He graduated from Von Steuben High School, then left the University of Wisconsin to enlist in the U.S. Army, where he served under Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower as a teletype operator.
Back home, he worked in a family exterminating business for nearly two decades before deciding when he was in his 40s to pursue a full-time career as an actor. He did not earn his Equity card until the early ’70s.
Nussbaum first made it to Broadway as the director of the 1982 musical comedy Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up?, but that lasted just five performances. He was back four years later with a role in John Guare’s The House of the Blue Leaves.
Nussbaum also played a con artist and mafia boss, respectively, in the Mamet films House of Games (1987) and Things Change (1988).
His onscreen résumé included Harry and Tonto (1974), Losing Isaiah (1995) and Steal Big Steal Little (1995), and TV turns in The Equalizer, 227, L.A. Law, Brooklyn Bridge, Frasier, The Commish, The X-Files and Early Edition.
In the Chicago magazine profile, he noted that he did 50 push-ups a day and drank a double shot of rye before bed every night.
Survivors include his second wife, Julie, whom he married in 2004; his children, Jack and Karen, and seven grandchildren. His first wife was Annette Brenner; they were married from 1949 until her death in 2003.
“I think that being an actor in Chicago, over a number of years, is the most satisfying life I could imagine,” Nussbaum told the Sun-Times in 2019. “I found New York and L.A. to be … antithetic to art. The desire for fame, the desire for glory, for money, is overwhelming in both cities. Although I had some success in both cities, I decided my life was more balanced here. I enjoy getting on the bus to go downtown and have someone come up and say, ‘I loved you in such-and-such.’”
