Great theatrical experiences in New York City take place not only on Broadway, but equally often, if not more so, on Off Broadway. It's a smart New York visitor who scours the theater listings for the Off Broadway productions. Off Broadway plays or musicals are performed in smaller theatres than Broadway, but larger than Off Off Broadway productions. Off Broadway theaters (venues) have anywhere from 100 to 499 seats. (By the way, the classification of theaters is governed by language in Actors' Equity contracts, rather than by whether the theater has a Broadway address.)
Generally, the productions that take place in Off Broadway theaters are less expensive, less publicized, less well-known and feature less famous performers. The smaller scale often allows more experimental, challenging work to be presented. Off Broadway is the country's most artistically influential and culturally diverse theater community. Eight of the last 10 winners of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama debuted Off Broadway
Here are TAP's recommendations for the best of Off Broadway taking place during the week of APsaA's Winter 2007 Meeting.
Toys in the Attic, by Lillian Hellman
The Pearl Theatre Company
80 St. Mark's Place
212-598-9802
On a steamy New Orleans evening a terrible thing happens to the Brenier family—all their dreams come true. Julian, the prodigal brother, sweeps home to his middle-aged sisters with the American dream in his pocket: an overnight fortune, a truckload of presents, even that trip to Europe they've imagined for years. But what happens when you discover the things you thought you wanted…aren't what you want at all? Lillian Hellman's last great play, Toys in the Attic (1960), follows a single day in the life of one family—as love turns destructive, innocence becomes dangerous, and truth will out…no matter the cost.
Angry Women in Low Rise Jeans
with High Class Issues
Theater for the New City
155 First Avenue
212-254-1109
This play is a light-to-serious look at the psychology of urban goddesses. It's one thing to be beautiful by an act of God. It's another to be paying for it every day of your life. These girls are coffee-driven, sensitive, wired, misunderstood, and fuming with awkward issues.
Suddenly Last Summer
Laura Pels Theatre
Roundabout Theatre Company
111 West 46th Street
212-719-1300
Mark Brokaw (The Constant Wife) directs the new production of the psychological drama by Tennessee Williams starring Blythe Danner and Carla Gugino. Though this play will have opened in November 2006 with no close date at this time, TAP anticipates that the run will be extended through January 2007.
The Scene
Second Stage Theatre
307 West 43rd Street
212-246-4422
This Theresa Rebeck play was a hit at the Humana Festival, a renowned theater event that takes place each spring in Louisville, Kentucky. The Scene is described as being a “biting new black comedy [that] takes on New York, the entertainment industry, marriage and even Ohio.” The play is also described as “a shrewd and bitter comedy about the empty narcissism of American pop culture.”
All That I Will Ever Be
New York Theater Workshop (NYTW)
79 East Fourth Street
212-460-5475
Alan Ball, the creator of HBO's Emmy Award-winning Six Feet Under and the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of American Beauty, has written his first new play in over a dozen years. All That I Will Ever Be is a richly characterized tale of cultural imperialism and our eternal search for belonging as seen through the eyes of two young men in Los Angeles, one a restless native Angeleno, the other an enigmatic immigrant from the Middle East.
Frank's Home
Playwrights Horizons
416 West 42nd Street
212-279-4200
A New York premiere written by Richard Nelson (Franny's Way; Tony Award for James Joyce's The Dead) and directed by Robert Falls (Tony Award for Death of a Salesman; Long Day's Journey.…).
It is summer, 1923, and architect Frank Lloyd Wright has recently left Chicago for California, determined to embrace Hollywood's youthful zest and mend broken relationships with his adult children. Having recently completed his latest “wonder of the world”—Tokyo's Imperial Hotel—Wright is poised to settle down and embrace his new home. But his splintered family still holds deep-seated resentments. Frank's Home is a lyrical, heartbreaking story about one of our greatest, if less than perfect, visionaries—a man who created a new architectural vocabulary but couldn't create a home for himself and his family.
Dottie Jeffries is APsaA's director of public affairs.
Must Don't Whip 'Um
St. Ann's Warehouse
38 Water St., Brooklyn
718-254-8779
Singer and performance artist Cynthia Hopkins' Must Don't Whip ‘Um is a Last Waltz-style farewell concert performance of one Cameron Seymour—obscure, failed pop star from the 1970s—on the eve of her disappearance. Must Don't Whip ‘Um blurs the lines between concert, spectacle, narrative, and theater.
The Coast of Utopia
Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center
150 West 65th Street
212-239-6200; outside NY
NY, CT call 800-432-7250
An eight-hour trilogy (Voyage, Shipwreck, Salvage) written by Tom Stoppard and directed by Jack O'Brien.
The second part of this trilogy, “Shipwreck”, will run from December 6, 2006, through March 10, 2007. In the mid-19th century, as revolution swept across Europe, a group of Russian intellectuals, journalists, critics, philosophers, poets and their friends tried to topple the tsar for the cause of freedom. Stoppard's epic follows these men and women over 30 years, as their intertwined lives, passions and dreams drive them in pursuit of perfection.
Note: Please know that each part of the trilogy stands alone as an exceptional theater experience should you not be able to attend the other two parts.
Japanese Contemporary Dance Showcase
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Avenue
212-242-0800
The 10th anniversary of the Japanese Contemporary Dance Showcase in New York makes a special appearance at The Joyce Theater. Dedicated to Japan's top contemporary dance companies, this event has drawn enthusiastic and loyal audiences to performances of the Dance Showcase at The Joyce Theater for the last nine years.