5 Shows to See in New York This Month

1. Well, I’ll Let You Go
Quincy Tyler Bernstine plays Maggie, a woman reeling after the sudden death of her husband in a traumatic incident that could have been deadlier without his intervention. Everyone in their small Midwestern town is hailing him as a hero, but Maggie privately wonders if she even knew him at all. Fragments of their lives emerge through a series of two-person scenes performed by an all-star cast including Michael Chernus, Will Dagger, Emily Davis, and Amelia Workman. If you’re looking to escape the August heat by entering a robust new American drama, this is your ticket.

2. Mamma Mia!
Of course, most folks will opt for lighter fare, and Mamma Mia!,  the long-lost daddy of jukebox musicals, has returned to Broadway just in time. Set on an idyllic Greek island mysteriously populated by American twinks, Catherine Johnson’s script tells the story of a young woman on the eve of her wedding. She’d like her father to walk her down the aisle, but she’s not exactly sure who he is. After reading her mother’s diary, she has narrowed it down to three candidates, all of whom are invited to the big day. Featuring the music of ABBA, which has reliably coaxed wedding guests to the dance floor for decades, Mamma Mia! will have you grooving in your seat as you are transported to the late ’90s—a more innocent time before social media, AI, and 9/11.

3. The Day I Accidentally Went to War
That latter catastrophe transformed American society and impacted the lives of over a million men and women in uniform. One of them was Bill Posley, who recounts how he stumbled into Iraq in his new solo show, The Day I Accidentally Went to War. A highly personal tale of the circumstances that led Posley into the Marines, it’s also an eye-opening look at how the same “meritocratic” pipeline that steers rich kids toward Harvard and McKinsey feeds the children of the working class into America’s war machine. But could the US military actually be better at producing a racially integrated society than those bastions of progressive academia? Posley has thoughts on that too, and they’re worth hearing.

4. Ava: The Secret Conversations
Movie buffs will certainly want to hear all the Hollywood hot goss shared in Ava: The Secret Conversations, which stars Elizabeth McGovern as screen legend Ava Gardner. Nearing the end of her life, she has invited British journalist Peter Evans (played by Aaron Costa Ganis) to ghostwrite her memoir. The script (written by McGovern) is based on Evans’s book, which was only published after his demise—so you know it has to be full of the good stuff. And it features some knockout performances. According to TheaterMania’s Kenji Fujishima, “McGovern imbues Gardner with such life-force that one can see how she attracted so many people into her orbit.” You can read that full review here.

5. Twelfth Night
Finally, I am thrilled to report that Shakespeare in the Park is up and running following last summer’s hiatus. It was worth the wait. The newly renovated Delacorte Theater is beautiful and will inevitably result in more summertime performances of first-rate theater, completely free of charge to the public. You can read more about the renovation here. Or, you could just wait to experience it for yourself by catching a performance of Shakespeare’s beloved comedy Twelfth Night, starring Sandra Oh, Lupita Nyong’o, Peter Dinklage, and Jesse Typer Ferguson, among others. It promises to close out summer 2025 with big laughs.