Broadway Reviews

'The Piano Lesson' review — Samuel L. Jackson, Danielle Brooks, and John David Washington strike all the right chords

The Piano Lesson at the Barrymore Theatre has been tuned to perfection. Under the deft guidance of LaTanya Richardson Jackson, who makes her Broadway directing debut, August Wilson’s stirring story filled with richly drawn characters, family drama, humor, and beyond-this-world mystery (cue the ghost!) comes vividly to life. Bluesy poetry and musicality are hallmarks of Wilson’s scripts. It’s easy to see – and hear – that here. Over the course of 2 3/4 hours, bits of boogie-woogie, spirituals,...

'Death of a Salesman' review — Wendell Pierce and Sharon D Clarke revitalize a time-honored tragedy

Few American plays are revisited on Broadway as often as Death of a Salesman. The play has received six productions in under 75 years, and this latest revival at the Hudson Theatre, brought over from an acclaimed London run, reminds us why. There is always new depth to be mined from Arthur Miller's story of Willy Loman, a man who all but worshipped the American Dream of prosperity through hard work, only to realize he worked his life away for naught. Casting Willy and his family as Black deepens...

'1776' review — gender-marginalized cast claims power historically denied them

There’s another award-winning history musical that contains the line, “When I meet Thomas Jefferson, I'mma compel him to include women in the sequel” - that is, to the Declaration of Independence. In 1969, the Best Musical winner 1776 dramatized the signing of that very document. The Founding Fathers still don’t include women, but this “sequel” - that is, revival, the first since 1997 - does the next best thing: employing a non-male cast as the men who once excluded them. It is, indeed, the...

'Cost of Living' review — a beautifully acted drama about connection and class

Martyna Majok’s Cost of Living follows shifting relationships between two disabled adults and their caregivers. The play arrives on Broadway four years after being awarded a Pulitzer Prize, an honor that is both a badge (bragging rights to an exclusive club) and baggage (escalated expectations). That’s the cost of winning. Over 110 unbroken minutes this lean, perceptive, and beautifully acted drama explores several provocative themes including connection and isolation as well as privilege and...

'Leopoldstadt' review — Tom Stoppard paints a masterful, memorable family portrait

In the opening tableau of Tom Stoppard's Leopoldstadt, a Jewish family, nearly 30 strong, assembles in a lavish sitting room and looks forward as if posing for a family portrait. A camera flashes. Haunting piano music plays. This moment dares us to remember — to sear these people, their multitude, their grandeur into our minds — before it's too late to salvage them from history. It is, indeed, a deeply personal dare from Stoppard himself, who never knew of his own Jewishness until his 50s, when...

'The Kite Runner' review — stage adaptation of bestselling book is faithful to a fault

In The Kite Runner, kite flying factors in two pivotal scenes. In the first, the actors come out waving gauzy white fabric hanging from springy wire rods, giving the illusion of kites flying in the air. At my performance, one of the kites failed to sufficiently lift off above the actor's head. It hovered slightly, then dipped toward the ground. The actor valiantly tried to pull it up, but the kite refused to take flight, seemingly comfortable bobbing along at shoulder height. This can be a...

'Into the Woods' review — Sara Bareilles, Brian d'Arcy James, and more lead a giant triumph of a revival

Find someone who looks at you the way the carb-loving Little Red Ridinghood locks eyes on a loaf of bread in the opening moments of the bewitchingly beautiful and impeccably performed Into the Woods at the St. James Theatre.Her besotted eyeballs all but scream, "More, please!" Turns out, the same expression was plastered on my face for almost three hours during this take on the late-1980s fairytale musical by composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim and writer James Lapine.Direct from a deservedly...

'Macbeth' review — Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga lead a 'star-enhanced hodgepodge'

Knives out. In the opening moment of Broadway's Macbeth starring Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga, a soldier is hoisted heavenward by his feet. He dangles there briefly before he's stabbed and bleeds out.Gore goes with Shakespeare's bloody tragedy in which "fair is foul and foul is fair" — or, in other words, where the world is turned upside down. The striking topsy-turvy image speaks plainly in a revival packing more puzzles than bracing urgency. For starters, what's up with the pre-show public...

'POTUS' review — star-studded cast girlbosses their way through the White House

There's a moment in the new Broadway play POTUS that made me cackle so loud, I surprised myself. It's a blink-and-you-miss-it moment. It occurs as the revolving set for POTUS is turning to a new scene in a woman's restroom. There's a tampon dispenser, and as the lights are still down, you can see the price for tampons: $2.79. Oof. The pink tax weighs heavy on the women of the play, both literally and figuratively. If only the rest of POTUS was as subtle or as smart.POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great...

'Mr. Saturday Night' review — Billy Crystal brings the comedy to a bloated musical

Summer, or at least a feel of summer stock, comes early with the arrival of the new but tired Broadway musical Mr. Saturday Night starring Billy Crystal.Based on a 1992 big-screen box-office dud that Crystal co-wrote, directed, and starred in, the fitfully amusing story spins around Buddy Young Jr., a has-been comic who lost his lucrative network gig but has never shed his self-sabotaging ways. Then, by fluke, he gets a second chance for professional and personal growth.It's the 1990s when we...