The 10 Best Broadway and Off-Broadway Performances of 2025

Crafting a best-of list for Broadway and off-Broadway performances is a big challenge, especially after a year like this, filled with unforgettable work. Reflecting on the theater of 2025, TheaterMania’s editorial staff has selected standout acting achievements that left an indelible mark on audiences. Here they are, in alphabetical order.

Danny Burstein — Jon in Marjorie Prime

Danny Burstein is one of those actors who is never less than excellent, but his utterly devastating turn in Jordan Harrison’s Marjorie Prime stands apart in a career that includes undeniably fantastic work in the likes of South Pacific, Gypsy, Follies, and Moulin Rouge!, for which he won a long-deserved Tony. As Jon—a devoted husband and doting son-in-law who proselytizes technology as a way to ease the suffering of the people he loves—Burstein has a climactic scene where you can practically see his heart shatter into a million pieces in real time. His own recent loss lends his work an unmistakable element of real grief, and it all adds up to a performance that ranks among the very best of his career, if not, perhaps, the best.
— David Gordon, Editor-in-Chief

Felicia Curry — Lemon Pepper Wings in Bowl EP

Two aspiring rappers flirt, smoke, and ride their skateboards through Nazareth Hassan’s unusual dreamscape of a play, Bowl EP, which transformed the Vineyard Theatre into a full-on skatepark earlier this year. Midway through, a third character arrives: Lemon Pepper Wings, a manic anime demon who doesn’t just explode out of one of the characters we’ve been watching—she explodes out of the play itself. “Is y’all ready for a mutha fuckin SHOW?” she asks, as her portrayer, Felicia Curry, jolts us upright and tears through Hassan’s dense monologues. Curry’s thrilling command of the whole space was furious and riveting. I didn’t have a clue what was going on — but I was there for every second.
— David Gordon, Editor-in-Chief

Micaela Diamond — Sabina in The Seat of Our Pants

A Micaela Diamond performance never fails to be a thrilling surprise. Ever since she made her Broadway debut at 19 as the youngest of The Cher Show’s three title divas, she’s been peeling back the layers of her talent, soaring as the headstrong Lucille in the 2023 revival of Parade and sulking as the angry revolutionary Fritz in Stephen Sondheim’s apocalyptic final musical Here We Are. She closed out 2025 as Sabina, the narrator/maid/beauty queen of Thornton Wilder’s epic allegory, The Skin of Our Teeth—though in its new tuneful form by Ethan Lipton, it ran at the Public Theater as The Seat of Our Pants. The source material is famously odd, the adaptation even odder, and Diamond was the weight-bearing beam that carried its humor, its pathos, and its philosophical headiness. It’s her best performance to date and has confirmed my suspicion that there’s nothing she can’t do.     
— Hayley Levitt, Critic

Patsy Ferran — Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Names Desire

Blanche is one of those characters everyone thinks they know, the faded Southern belle that time forgot. But Ferran offered a strikingly modern take in Rebecca Frecknall’s revival, which played BAM earlier this year. Terminally congested and completely delulu, this was a Blanche you might actually meet in the Faubourg Marigny in 2025—another Brooklyn refugee still chasing her dreams at a discount. Watching her within the crumbling splendor of the Harvey Theater, it became uncomfortably clear that Streetcar is not a period piece, but a perennial tragedy of an American type of progress that will eventually consume us all.
— Zachary Stewart, Chief Critic

Jonathan Groff — Bobby Darin in Just in Time

He sings. He dances. He charms. And yes, Jonathan Groff does this every time he takes the stage! But the Tony Award-winning actor only takes his talents—and spirit—to new heights in Just in Time, the innovative “bio-musical” where he simultaneously “plays” himself while evoking the spirit of the late, great singer Bobby Darin. For two hours, it’s like watching the Energizer Bunny come to life in human form; Groff is always splishing, always splashing (and always spitting). Yet, most importantly, he is always connecting to the audience both physically and emotionally, making you share his own joy in performing and Darin’s pain as the entertainer’s life takes some unexpected and unpleasant turns. To put it simply, Groff is just incredible.
— Brian Scott Lipton, Features Contributor

Joshua Henry — Coalhouse Walker Jr. in Ragtime

Joshua Henry has been a Broadway mainstay for well over a decade, wowing audiences with his muscular baritenor and versatile acting in shows like The Scottsboro Boys and Carousel. If you were a fan of his coming into Ragtime, you will be a mega-fan coming out. He delivers a performance for the ages as Coalhouse Walker Jr., a man who suffers injustice and refuses to turn the other cheek. In an already stellar production, Henry shines brighter than ever in his duet with Nichelle Lewis, “Sarah Brown Eyes,” and the rousing “Make Them Hear You.” There’s not a dry eye in the house after Henry works his magic.
— Pete Hempstead, Managing Editor

Amber Iman — Nadira in Goddess

Amber Iman has one of the most gorgeous voices in theater with vocals like crushed velvet, even when she’s belting to the rafters. Audiences got to hear it last year in Lempicka, and she gave us an even bigger earful this year when she starred, appropriately enough, as Marimba, the goddess of music, in Goddess at the Public Theater. The show had a terrific score that Iman took to heartbreaking heights in songs like “Learn to Love” and her duet with Austin Scott, “Near You.” Though some found fault with Goddess for its storyline, none could do that with Iman’s performance. It was truly divine.
— Pete Hempstead, Managing Editor

Laurie Metcalf — Sarah in Little Bear Ridge Road

She is the queen of being flinty and feisty, both on the staged and on screens big and small, but just because Laurie Metcalf aces the tailor-made role of Sarah, a dying nurse, in Samuel Hunter’s affecting Idaho-set drama Little Bear Ridge Road doesn’t make her achievement any less remarkable. Yes, she can harangue a colleague on the phone with unrivaled anger, and she can spar with her troubled nephew Ethan (the equally brilliant Micah Stock) with the one-two punch of a heavyweight champion. In an instant, though, Metcalf can also demonstrate Sarah’s depths – of compassion, of loneliness, of fear – in subtle ways that can astound and surprise even those of us who have watched her work for decades. It’s this combination of the expected and the unexpected from this consummate actress that makes it worth your time and money to cross this road!
— Brian Scott Lipton, Features Contributor

Zachary Noah Piser — Spencer in Redwood

The mention of this short-lived Tina Landau and Kate Diaz musical is likely to conjure the image of Idina Menzel belting her face off while swinging from a giant tree, but I will always remember Zachary Noah Piser’s 11 o’clock number, “Still,” in which a dead son urges his surviving mother to embrace life. Piser brought recording-quality vocals and an achingly sincere delivery to the number, leaving a good portion of the audience misty—exactly where you want them before curtain call.
— Zachary Stewart, Chief Critic

Andrew Scott — All the Roles in Vanya

New York City has seen a few versions of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya in recent years. A Broadway revival with Steve Carell. A claustrophobic production in a Flatiron loft. I happened to love them both. But when Andrew Scott wrapped his arms around himself like a teen girl fantasizing about the quarterback and managed to deliver the most sensual iteration of Astrov and Yelena’s Act 3 tryst, his solo Vanya went from party trick to masterpiece. It rode to the Lucille Lortel Theatre on a wave of buzz from its West End run and still managed to exceed expectations, giving all the humor, despair, and excessive drinking you want in an Uncle Vanya—and in under two hours. Thanks to the era of streaming, you can cuddle up with your own ennui and watch it on National Theatre at Home.
— Hayley Levitt, Critic