What: MCC presents Preston Max Allen's new play about a young mother in recovery from addiction, crossing state borders to find a safe place to raise and support her trans daughter.
And? You gotta hate when a play is this relevant sometimes. The full-body fear that Maddie feels for her daughter's wellbeing radiates off her, even when she's gotten her to a safer state. And it's no wonder: Caroline's left arm is in a heavy cast and sling, and they have clearly left town as soon as the plaster dried. I hate that it is this scary, this unsafe, to be a trans person in the States right now. I hate especially how vulnerable these kids are.
The production is well-directed by David Cromer (as always), delivering three strong performances: Chloë Grace Moretz as the exposed nerve Maddie, trying like hell to prove to her mom that she's changed; River Lipe-Smith as young Caroline, inquisitive and straightforward, knowing who she is and what she wants; and Amy Landecker as Maddie's mother Rhea, her pristine polish a delicate mask over years of fear and pain. Tyler Micoleau's lighting design helps shape so much of the feel and energy of each space.
9/24/25: Masquerade
What: A new immersive promenade production of Andrew Lloyd Webber, Charles Hart, and Richard Stilgoe's long-running behemoth, The Phantom of the Opera. Guided by Madame Giry through the memories of the opera house, the audience travels room to room across the backstage areas (and the Phantom's underground spaces), and even back to memories past. Text-wise it's an abridged version of the full-length musical, incorporating some elements of Erik and Giry's Coney Island backstory from Phantom's sequel Love Never Dies.
And? There are so many things to praise, I almost don't know where to start! Actually I'm going to start with the unsung heroes: the butlers/staff in the white masks that help guide the audience through the experience are so conscientious that they noticed I was very short and made it a point to position me where I could see what was going on, in every new space we entered. Adiditionally, some of the taller audience members clocked this as well, and very courteously offered to switch places with me a few times. It's the little things, you know? *rim shot*
Secondly, as an overall: this is a fantastic translation of the musical into a new environment and new framework. They still kept a lot of the notable style notes for the fans: Fog machines? Check. Synth? Check. Three thousand candles? Check. The production contains plenty of Easter eggs for the Phans, while still providing a clear and compelling experience for people new to the story. The intimacy of being in the room with the characters (who only sometimes acknowledge us, Sleep No More-style) allows them to lean into the quiet moments, even whispering to each other, and dialing down the Grand Guignol elements. This more intimate performance style throws the overblown antics of Carlotta (the hilarious Betsy Morgan) and Piangi (Phumzile Sojola)--to say nothing of the Phantom's histrionics--into delightful relief. This intimacy also grants the audience small particular asides from various players as they move through the space: the soused stage manager Buquet muttering about Carlotta's prima donna attitude as he pushes through the crowd, or a stage hand warning us as he passed us in a hallway that this new opera Don Juan Triumphant is a disaster and the managers are wasting their money on it.
The audience entry times to the evening are staggered in fifteen-minute intervals: There's a complicated metric for cast rotations, but my understanding is each pulse has its own Phantom and Christine, while Raoul and Madame Giry performers each cover two out of the six pulses per engagement, and the smaller principle roles, like Andre, Firmin, Carlotta, and Piangi are in every "pulse" (Meg also varies but that's in part because some of the Christines also play Meg -- seriously, these performers must be so wiped out at the end! Each pulse has around sixty audience members, though we are often broken up into smaller groups for some of the more intimate moments (like the dressing room). I saw a few moments of small groups being pulled aside for activities I wasn't participating in (some kind of intricate gesture choreography; and I've heard about a few others), so while not every audience member has an identical experience, we still all get the meat of the show, and enough smaller moments to feel like we're having our own individual and special experience. And, as you'll see in the below picture, I was gifted one of the "Opera Ghost's" notorious letters, with a wax seal shaped like a skull.
The cast for my pulse featured a former Broadway Christine reprising the role, Kaley Ann Voorhees. Truly excellent on every level. I was delighted to see Raymond J. Lee as manager Andre, because I am always delighted to see Raymond J. Lee in anything. As previously mentioned, Betsy Morgan is a delightfully hammy Carlotta, and Maree Johnson as our guide Madame Giry is giving her best Mrs. Danvers and let me say, it is fantastic. We had covers for both the Phantom (Cooper Grodin) and Raoul (Nkrumah Gatling), but I wouldn't have been able to tell they didn't play the roles every night, if there weren't a program insert telling me after the fact.
It's tempting to return, knowing my historic penchant for immersive experiences in general, and rotating casts as well--they're my pokemon, and I gotta catch 'em all. I would certainly like to return and see the other Phantoms, Christines, and Raouls. But I do have to say that the ticket price is a bit of a bar on return visits for me. I'm so glad I went, but the only way I could afford to return and return (past the point of no return, if you will ... I'm sorry, I'll show myself out), would be if I did so at the expense of the rest of my Fall theater-going budget.
It's okay. We grow and change and we get to see a lot of really great and varied theater this way. And I may have talked myself into going back with my friend Marissa, because yelling about Andrew Lloyd Webber helped us survive 2020.
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| Souvenirs of the night. Photo by Zelda Knapp. |
9/25/25: This is Government
What: 59E59 presents Nina Kissinger's play about three staffers in a congressman's office stuck inside when someone calls in a bomb threat. It's a comedy though.
And? The banter in this play is top-notch, though style-wise I'm not sure the characters as played are quite in the same space. Still, the pacing is quick like it needs to be, and the staging dynamic. I'm particularly fond of the scene changes (that's not shade on the scenes, I just want to highlight when a production handles scene changes as storytelling moments, rather than just blackouts; so props to director Sarah Norris and movement director Yasmyn Sumiyoshi for mining this opportunity)--the pulsing lights (Hayley Garcia Parnell), the sound of the ever-ticking clock (Jennie Gorn), the post-it reveals (Daniel Allen). Allen's scenic design in general is a treat: walking the tightrope between naturalism and metaphor without overstating it. The cast is enjoyable, with Susan Lynskey's performance of Stevie a particular standout, bringing pathos and passion reminiscent of Frances Conroy. The play itself does a good job of troubling the water of how we hold our nation's leaders accountable, and the consequences when we don't. But, especially keeping in mind our recent real-life incidents of political violence this year, I also kept coming back to Stephen Sondheim's lyric in Assassins:
And it didn't mean a nickel,
You just shed a little blood.
And a lot of people shed a lot of tears.
Yes, you made a little moment
And you stirred a little mud,
But it didn't fix the stomach
And you've drunk your final Bud
And it didn't help the workers
And it didn't heal the country
And it didn't make them listen
And they never said, "We're sorry"--
I just. Don't like this trend. I don't like where we're going. And I don't think it's helping anyone on any side of the political divide. So it's good to have plays that dialogue with this moment.
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| Foreground: Vann Dukes, Kleo Mitrokostas, Charles Hsu as Kaz, Emi, and Tip. Rear: Susan Lynskey as Stevie. Photo by Burdette Parks. |
9/26/25: This Much I Know
What: 59E59 presents Jonathan Spector's play inspired by Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow, about a psychology professor trying to unpack why his wife left suddenly, interspersed with his wife's investigation in Russia, the story of Stalin's expat daughter Svetlana, and a student recently exposed as being the scion of a white nationalist movement.
And? It's hard to put into words how and why this was so special, but man did it fuck me up. Plays that are not just stories but also about ideas and worldviews will do that, make you think and map the conversations onto your own life and experiences. The professor's self-examination; the question explored in multiple time periods about the space between culpability and responsibility when tragedy strikes, and how we reckon with the various guilts of that; the arc of someone with very wrong ideas but an open enough mind to listen and actually fully rewrite his world view; and the possibility of forgiveness. It all just--it's so much, and the way the play works is so effective, the way scenes bleed into each other, taking advantage of the three-hander cast to change midline from one grouping to another. I was already feeling many many powerful feelings, loving the show, and then that last beat took my breath away. Go see this, if you can. Jonathan Spector plays are not to be missed.
9/27/25: Katsura Sunshine's Rakugo
What: Katsura Sunshine, the second non-Japanese Rakugo artist, brings the work to New York on a monthly basis at New World Stages.
And? It's a cool jaunt: an early equivalent of what stand-up comedy became in the West, with each set being a long-form joke-story, rather than a series of smaller bon mots. Katsura Sunshine performs alongside several of his apprentices. It's a fun time, and I like that it's my last theater before I leave for my visit to Japan next week.
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