New York Spotlight: October 2009

A pair of musical revivals lead off this month’s new Broadway entries. Finian’s Rainbow, seen as an Encores staging this past spring, transfers to the St. James Theatre (beginning October 8) with stars Jim Norton, Kate Baldwin, and Cheyenne Jackson repeating their roles, alongside new cast members Christopher Fitzgerald and Chuck Cooper. Meanwhile, Arlington’s Signature Theatre transfers its production of the Terrence McNally-Lynn Ahrens-Stephen Flaherty musical Ragtime to the Neil Simon Theatre (beginning October 23), with a cast including Ron Bohmer, Quentin Earl Darrington, Christiane Noll, Robert Petkoff, and Bobby Steggert.

Another musical transferring to the Main Stem is Fela! (Eugene O’Neill Theatre, beginning October 19), which had a successful run Off-Broadway last year. Directed and choreographed by Bill T. Jones, the piece is based on the life and music of African composer and performer Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, with original star Sahr Ngaujah and Daytime Emmy Award winner Kevin Mambo sharing the title role. The cast also features Tony Award-winner Lillias White and Saycon Sengbloh.

Playwright Sarah Ruhl makes her much anticipated Broadway debut with In the Next Room or the vibrator play at the Lyceum Theatre, beginning October 22. Laura Benanti and Michael Cerveris lead the cast of this comedy, set at the dawn of the age of electricity. The first of this season’s two Neil Simon revivals, Brighton Beach Memoirs, begins performances at Broadway’s Nederlander Theatre, on October 2. Set in 1937, the play focuses on a young Jewish teen and his extended family. Newcomer Noah Robbins plays Jerome, with the cast also including stage vets Laurie Metcalf, Dennis Boutsikaris, Santino Fontana, and Jessica Hecht.

Willem Dafoe stars in Richard Foreman’s Idiot Savant, at the Public Theater, October 27-December 13. The piece is described as “a philosophical comedy,” and includes existential and metaphysical acrobatics, as well as a game of inter-species golf with a Giant Duck. Meanwhile, Tarell Alvin McCraney presents the New York premiere of his trilogy, The Brother Sister Plays (October 21-December 13) at the Public, with Part 1’s In the Red and Brown Water directed by Tina Landau, and Part 2’s The Brothers Size and Marcus; or the Secret of Sweet directed by Robert O’Hara. Also at the Public is Brooklyn hip-hop artist Lemon Anderson’s autobiographical solo County of Kings, through November 8.

Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Justin Kirk, and Julie White star in Theresa Rebeck’s The Understudy at the Roundabout’s Laura Pels Theatre, October 9-January 3. Scott Ellis directs. Meanwhile, the Roundabout presents its first musical in its Underground space, Ordinary Days, written by Adam Gwon, and telling the story of four young New Yorkers, played by Lisa Brescia, Hunter Foster, Jared Gertner, and Kate Wetherhead.

Marylouise Burke, Darren Goldstein, Sofia Jean Gomez, Trisha Rodley, Will Rogers, and Jeremy Shamos are featured in Heidi Schreck’s Creature (Ohio Theatre, October 27-November 21), set in Medieval England and about a woman who sets about trying to become a saint. Richard Masur and Alice Playten star in Roger Rosenblatt’s The Oldsmobiles (Flea Theater, October 1-November 14), about a couple who question whether or not life is still worth living. John Douglas Thompson takes on the title role in Eugene O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones at Irish Rep, October 7-November 29.

After shuttering on Broadway last month, the Tony Award-winning musical Avenue Q gets a new lease on life with an Off-Broadway production at New World Stages, beginning October 9. Anika Larsen and Seth Rettberg head the cast. Also making a move to New World Stages is Daniel Jenkins and Robert Stanton’s Love Child (October 23-January 3), which Primary Stages debuted last year.

Lincoln Center presents Ann Marie Healy’s What Once We Felt, as part of its LCT3 initiative at the Duke on 42nd Street, October 26-November 22. Set in the near future, the play follows a writer’s journey through the political world of publishing. Two-time Tony winner Judith Ivey stars as legendary advice columnist Ann Landers in The Lady With All the Answers at the Cherry Lane, October 7-November 29. Canadian auteur Robert LePage presents his 8 ½ hour opus, Lipsynch at BAM’s Harvey Theater, October 3-11. Alix Korey, Emily Zacharias, and Stanley Bahorek are among the cast members of Benjamin Feldman’s Inventing Avi, at the Abingdon Theatre Arts Complex, October 2-November 1.

Written and performed by Charlayne Woodard, The Night Watcher is presented by Primary Stages at 59E59 Theaters, through October 31. The venue also hosts Good Bobby, which takes a look at the life and career of Robert F. Kennedy, October 8-November 8. Also, Ghost Light is at 59E59 October 14-31, telling the tale of two artists who arrive at a motel room for an afternoon of clandestine sex.

Among this year’s Halloween treats are the interactive experience Purgatorio, which has taken over a Times Square area nightclub (October 15-31); Nightmare: Vampires, a fully immersive haunted house masterminded by Timothy Haskell (NOHO Event Center, through November 7); and RADIOTHEATRE’s production of Frankenstein at the Kraine, October 11-December 19.

Also around town, Maggie Siff plays Aphra Behn in The Women’s Project’s Or, at the Julia Miles Theater, October 29-November 22; Keen Company presents a program of Thornton Wilder one-acts, Such Things Only Happen in Books at the Clurman Theatre, October 6-November 14; Antoinette LaVecchia’s one-woman-show How to Be a Good Italian Daughter (In Spite of Myself) begins an open-ended run at the Cherry Lane’s Studio Theatre on October 3; Theatre East presents Tim Blake Nelson’s Eye of God a the Kirk Theatre, October 2-17; writer-director Enda Walsh’s The New Electric Ballroom comes to St. Ann’s Warehouse, courtesy of DruidIreland, October 27-November 22; and downtown legend John Jahnke debuts his newest work, The Archery Contest at PS 122, October 2-18.