New York

I CAN’T CAVE ENOUGH In 1917, Kentucky cave explorer Floyd Collins discovered Crystal Cave. Located in the same area as Mammoth Cave—the longest cave system known in the world—the site operated as a tourist attraction by his family. In 1925, while searching for a new entrance to the hundreds of miles of interconnected caves, Collins…

SHARP AS EVER, BUT DOES IT CUT DEEP ENOUGH? OR, IF YOU WANT BIGGER SHARKS, YOU NEED MORE BLOOD IN THE WATER Glengarry Glen Ross is a testosterone-saturated 24 hours of five salesmen, some metaphorically dying like Willie Loman–others who go home at night and live, no doubt, in a shark tank. Their best sales…

A WAR OF WORDS BETWEEN BERNSTEIN AND VON KARAJAN… AND THE AUDIENCE LOSES Peter Danish‘s Last Call at New World Stages imagines a high-stakes intellectual showdown between two musical titans—Leonard Bernstein and Herbert von Karajan—in Sacher Hotel’s Blaue Bar in Vienna, 1988. On paper, this has the makings of an electrifying clash: a liberal Jewish…

IT’LL KNOCK THE PANTS OFF O’ YOUSE Who Is Jimmy Pants? is the second production in the York’s Spring 2025 “New2NY” series, presented at the Theater at St. Jean’s on East 76th Street—a welcome upgrade from their former home at Saint Peter’s Church, which was unfortunately lost to flooding in 2021. This 90-minute concert-style staged…

HERE’S A BROADWAY SUCCESS THAT ALSO BRIMS WITH PURPOSE Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ doesn’t just expose the cracks in a so-called perfect life—he shines a floodlight on them. Except for a few sequences, Purpose, his triumphant new work which opened March 17, is not earth-shattering—yet it’s extremely consequential. Here’s a writer who can create a topical play…

WE HAD A BALL Manhattan Theatre Club’s We Had a World is an unconventional modern-day three-hander memory play that covers roughly 30 years. Our diarist, memoirist, and damn funny playwright Joshua Harmon is trying to make sense of a real-life senseless event at a Passover dinner, but what he creates–with himself as the protagonist Joshua…

UPSIDE DOWN A STRAIGHT UP MUSICAL SATIRE I admire AMT Theater for two key reasons: its dedication to developing new works—particularly musicals, which I’ve witnessed in the past—and its commitment to showcasing up-and-coming talent, often granting well-deserved Off-Broadway debuts. It’s also impressive that this intimate 97-seat venue is staging the two-act musical Upside Down with…

FROM HAVANA TO BROADWAY: A SOCIAL CLUB WORTH JOINING Buena Vista Social Club is a sun-drenched, rhythm-soaked explosion of life, proving that sometimes a show just needs space to breathe—and in this case, to raise the roof. After its more intimate Off-Broadway run at The Atlantic, this production has found its true home on the…

LOOK HOMEWARD, ANGEL In what may be the slowest lights-up in New York theater, the first cue of Grangeville takes several minutes to complete—perhaps a 400 count. But lighting designer Stacey Derosier isn’t being indulgent. Instead, she masterfully isolates the estranged voices of two half-brothers speaking on the phone. Caught in a void of blackness,…

WIT, WONDER AND WILD CHIMPS Embarking on a theatrical safari at the Ensemble Studio Theatre (EST), I stumbled upon a wildly witty gem tonight that rivals the most exhilarating of jungle adventures. Some plays lecture. Others live. Have You Met Jane Goodall and Her Mother? is the latter—a marvel of a comedy that doesn’t just…