★★★★☆ The Prospect Theater Company has Stephen Schwartz, Gretchen Cryer, Jeff Blumenkrantz, other witty songwriters on tap
Off-Broadway
Anyone Can Whistle: One-Night Laurents-Sondheim Revival Often Whistle-Worthy
★★★☆☆ Ted Sperling conducts/directs Vanessa Williams, Elizabeth Stanley, Santino Fontana, Joanna Gleason, many more to effect
Anyone Can Whistle: Famously Troubled Musical, Flaws Magnified
★★★☆☆ Santino Fontana and Elizabeth Stanley shine in an under-rehearsed semi-staging of the Sondheim-Laurents not-quite-masterwork
This Space Between Us: Making Room For Change
★★★★☆ A fine ensemble cast serves Peter Gil-Sheridan’s study of a successful man trying, against all odds, to make a difference
The Chinese Lady: For Your Education, Entertainment, and Discomfort
★★★★☆ Playwright Lloyd Suh draws on real-life 19th-century events with 21st-century ramifications in this Ma-Yi Theater, Barrington Stage, and Public Theater production
The Chinese Lady: Exoticized, Mistreated, and Still a Cipher
★★★☆☆ The story of the first Chinese woman in America is horrifying, and all these years later we’re still telling it
A Touch of the Poet: Robert Cuccioli a Figure of Valor in Eugene O’Neill’s Drama
★★★★☆ Ciarán O’Reilly directs a worthy revival of a play about a raging pub owner bent on his own destruction
On Sugarland: An Ambitious, Epic Wartime Drama
★★★★☆ Aleshea Harris explores the aftermath of war and the shades of grief in a shattering new play
On Sugarland: Playwright Aleshea Harris Concentrates on Black Lives Mattering
★★★☆☆ Whitney White directs a smooth ensemble portraying people trying to persist in a far-flung Southern cul-de-sac
Out of Time: Five Monologues Masterfully Capturing Contemporary Anxiety
★★★★☆ Five BIPOC playwrights, five BIPOC actors, directed by Les Waters, hit involving high notes