Cats: The Jellicle Ball (Broadhurst Theatre)

By Harry Forbes

Watching the current reworking of Cats, I couldn't help recalling my experience at the original Broadway production shortly after it opened. I sat behind an English woman who grew visibly agitated as the evening progressed. During intermission, she sobbed to her companions, "They've ruined it, they've ruined it."

I suspected she had been one of the post-Elaine Paige Grizabellas from the original London production. Whether her distress stemmed from the textual and musical alterations — of which there were several — or simply from a perceived dilution of the show's essential Englishness, I never learned. But I couldn't help wondering, with no small amusement, what she'd make of this hugely revamped revival, now on Broadway following an acclaimed run last year at the Perelman Performing Arts Center.

The show has been thoroughly — and quite brilliantly — reset in the 1980s ballroom culture, where LGBTQ+ performers strutted elaborate costumes on the runway, competing for coveted trophies. Since Cats — based on T.S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats — is essentially a series of vaudeville turns held together by the slenderest of storylines, it adapts surprisingly well to the new treatment.

That said, the concept took some warming to on my part, and I suspect it won't be everyone's cup of tea — though my audience was wildly enthusiastic from the first number. I left the theater feeling I had witnessed something genuinely special.

To the production's credit, the score is played more or less intact, in the correct song order, with lyrics unchanged despite their numerous references to things both feline and quintessentially English. As far as I can tell, only two numbers have been cut entirely: the "Pekes and Pollicles" episode in the first act and "Growltiger's Last Stand" in the second. Otherwise, The Jellicle Ball hews scrupulously to Eliot and composer Andrew Lloyd Webber. The songs don't always fit the literal situations precisely, but they consistently deliver emotional truth.

Lloyd Webber's richly varied score — one of his very best — sounds as good as ever. For all the jokes Cats inspired in its day, it's worth remembering what a boldly audacious concept it was, and what a hot ticket too. The original Trevor Nunn staging, with its iconic Gillian Lynne choreography, made its record-breaking way around the world, and I treasure it still. But this version is entirely its own thing.

Directed by Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch, the production pays poignant homage to the ballroom scene in a moving slide-show montage at the top of Act Two. The reimagined choreography, the clever work of Omari Wiles and Arturo Lyons, crackles with invention. Kai Harada's sound design is, as is too often the case these days, overly amplified — but things settle appropriately for the score's quieter, more reflective moments.

The cast is impressive across the board. André De Shields is a far cry from the richly sonorous bass-baritones of London originator Brian Blessed and Broadway's Ken Page, but he makes Old Deuteronomy entirely his own. "Tempress" Chasity Moore makes Grizabella a genuinely touching outcast and delivers a moving "Memory." Junior LaBeija brings real poignancy to Gus, the aging theater cat. Sydney James Harcourt commands the stage as Rum Tum Tugger, and Robert "Silk" Mason dazzles as Magical Mister Mistoffelees.

The large ensemble alsoincludes Ken Ard (DJ Griddlebone), Kya Azeen (Etcetera), Bryson Battle (Jellylorum), Jonathan Burke (Mungojerrie), Baby Byrne (Victoria), Dava Huesca (Rumpleteazer), Dudney Joseph Jr. (Munkustrap), Leiomy (Demeter), Primo Thee Ballerino (Tumblebrutus), Xavier Reyes (Jennyanydots), Nora Schell (Bustopher Jones), Bebe Nicole Simpson (Demeter), Emma Sofia (Skimbleshanks), Garnet Williams (Bombalurina), and Teddy Wilson Jr. (Sillibub).

Rachel Hauck's evocative set beautifully conjures the ballroom atmosphere, and Qween Jean has a field day with an array of extravagantly dazzling costumes.

(Broadhurst Theatre, 235 West 44th Street; catsthejellicleball.com)

Photo by Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade: Nora Schell as ‘Bustopher Jones’

Schmigadoon! (Nederlander Theatre)

By Harry Forbes

The stage adaptation of the "Schmigadoon!" television series is an absolute delight, surpassing its already amusing source material with a top-flight cast, an expanded score, and an infectious sense of joy. Composer-lyricist-book writer Cinco Paul lovingly spoofs the Golden Age musicals of the 1940s and ’50s, delivering pitch-perfect parodies of iconic numbers from “Oklahoma!,” “Carousel,” “The Music Man,” and others, giving audiences the delicious pleasure of instant recognition.

The story follows Josh Skinner (Alex Brightman) and Melissa Gimble (Sara Chase), a pair of doctors whose relationship has grown stale. While hiking in the woods, they stumble upon a magical town much like the lost travelers of “Brigadoon.” Here, every resident exists as the embodiment of a musical-comedy cliché, bursting into song at the slightest provocation. Josh, however, loathes musicals and stubbornly resists every cue, even when pursued by the aggressively flirtatious Betsy (McKenzie Kurtz), a clear descendant of Ado Annie. Melissa, by contrast, eagerly embraces the fantasy, particularly when she catches the eye of the swaggering carnival barker Danny Bailey (Max Clayton), a thinly veiled riff on Billy Bigelow.

Among the town’s colorful inhabitants are the closeted Mayor Menlove (Brad Oscar) — the name says it all — and his wife Florence (Ann Harada). Maulik Pancholy plays Reverend Layton, who seems to harbor a touching sympathy for the mayor’s predicament, while his domineering wife Mildred (Ana Gasteyer) appoints herself guardian of the town’s morality. Her second-act sendup of “Ya Got Trouble” is one of the evening’s comic high points.

Then there is Doc (Ivan Hernandez), a Captain Von Trapp figure straight out of “The Sound of Music,” who hires Melissa as his nurse, paving the way for a riotously funny parody of “Do-Re-Mi” — this one devoted to explaining human reproduction. Josh, meanwhile, briefly convinces himself that the key to escaping the town may lie with the sweetly wholesome schoolmarm Emma Tate (Isabelle McCalla).

The cast could scarcely be bettered. Though it seems almost criminal to give the powerhouse vocalist Brightman so little actual singing, his deadpan resistance to the town’s relentless cheerfulness makes for a beautifully calibrated comic performance. Chase radiates a realstic initial wariness but succombs chamingly, while Gasteyer nearly steals the show with her thunderously self-righteous Mildred. Oscar and Pancholy lend unexpected poignancy beneath the comedy, and Kurtz and Clayton expertly capture the broad, hearty style of mid-century musical leads.

Christopher Gattelli, who choreographed the television version, handles both staging and choreography here with enormous flair and buoyancy. Scott Pask’s set vividly conjures the candy-colored world of Golden Age Broadway, enhanced by Donald Holder’s glowing lighting and Linda Cho’s witty, character-defining costumes. Walter Trarbach’s sound design, meanwhile, strikes an ideal balance throughout.

Altogether, “Schmigadoon!” emerges as a joyous valentine to the classic American musical — affectionate, clever, and irresistibly entertaining.

(Nederlander Theatre 208 West 41st Street; schmigadoonbroadway.com)

Photo by Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman: The cast of “Schmigadoon”

Fallen Angels (Roundabout Theatre Company)

By Harry Forbes

Though not quite in the exalted league of Noël Coward classics like “Private Lives” and “Design for Living,” his 1925 comedy “Fallen Angels” still sparkles with the playwright’s signature wit. Roundabout Theatre Company has mounted a sumptuous revival, directed with style by Scott Ellis.

Kelli O'Hara and Rose Byrne — fresh off Byrne’s Oscar-nominated turn in “If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You” — star as Julia and Jane, the sophisticated friends originally played by Tallulah Bankhead and Edna Best.

Years earlier, both women had affairs with the same French Lothario, Maurice — and, daringly for its era, the play leaves little doubt that the relationships were far from platonic. When Maurice announces by post that he is coming to London to see them, the now-settled wives are thrown into romantic turmoil. As the anticipated reunion fails to materialize, Julia and Jane drink themselves into a deliciously comic stupor, unleashing volleys of brittle, bitchy repartee.

Meanwhile, their husbands — Fred (Aasif Mandvi) and Willy (Christopher Fitzgerald) — remain blissfully oblivious, off golfing while emotional chaos reigns at home. Hovering nearby is Julia’s overly precociouis maid Saunders, played with excellent comic timing by Tracee Chimo.

The cast is uniformly strong. O’Hara, so often cast as poised and proper heroines (with “Days of Wine and Roses” a notable exception), gets a welcome opportunity to flaunt her comic gifts. Byrne, meanwhile, is especially hilarious in the latter half of the brisk, intermissionless 90-minute adaptation. (The original play ran three acts.) Fitzgerald delivers his usual amusing work, while Mark Consuelos makes an appealing late entrance as the elusive French charmer.

David Rockwell’s lavish drawing-room set for Julia and Fred’s London home is plushly opulent, beautifully illuminated by Kenneth Posner. Jeff Mahshie contributes stylish period costumes that add greatly to the production’s visual appeal. John Gromada’s sound design is generally unobtrusive, though occasional audibility issues suggest that a touch more sound enhancement might not have gone amiss.

In the end, this revival of “Fallen Angels” may amount to decidedly lightweight entertainment, but enjoyably so all the same.

(Todd Haimes Theatre, 227 W 42nd St.; roundabouttheatre.org; through June 7)

Photo by Joan Marcus: (l.-r.) Kelli O’Hara, Mark Consuelos, and Rose Byrne

Utopia, Limited (New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players)

By Harry Forbes

NYGASP has finally gotten around to a fully staged production of the penultimate comic opera by W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, and it proved well worth the wait. Though the work was better received at its 1893 premiere than the duo’s final collaboration, The Grand Duke—with music critic George Bernard Shaw among its admirers—it subsequently disappeared from the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company repertoire. Not until the company’s centenary revival in 1975 was it fully recorded and given renewed attention.

NYGASP itself had offered a one-performance concert staging in 2010, but this new production was more complete, with sets, costumes, and a more fully restored text.

The story unfolds on a South Sea island, where King Paramount awaits the return of his daughter Zara from England, where she and her sisters have been educated in the “superior” English way of life. Zara brings with her a cadre of “Flowers of Progress” to modernize the island along British lines. She is in love with her protector, Captain Fitzbattleaxe of the First Life Guards, but the King’s scheming advisors, Scaphio and Phantis, have designs on her as well. Meanwhile, they are blackmailing the King into publishing scandalous attacks on himself in the press.

Gilbert’s dialogue here can be dense, but director James Mills kept the action moving briskly, never allowing the evening to drag. The same was true of music director Joseph Rubin, whose superb conducting maintained a buoyant energy throughout, drawing on what was said to be a newly restored edition of Sullivan’s original orchestrations.

The cast was uniformly strong. Matthew Wages made an outstanding King Paramount—one of the best I have seen—combining a warm baritone with finely judged comic acting. As his love interest, the English governess Lady Sophy, Hannah Holmes sang with rich tone and incisive clarity. Her opening number, “Bold Face Ranger,” a cautionary tale warning her charges against forward suitors, was a showstopper, delightfully staged by Mills and co-director/choreographer David Auxier.

The conniving advisors Scaphio and Phantis were ideally played by Vince Gover and Lance Olds, respectively, their voices blending beautifully while their comic interplay landed with precision. Gover, in particular, had some riotous moments upon first encountering Zara, barely containing his ardor. Sam Balzac did good work as Tarara, the Public Exploder.

Sophie Thompson’s Zara was both vocally assured and dramatically engaging, while Cameron Smith—who had played Fitzbattleaxe in the 2010 semi-staged concert—returned to the role in fine voice. Laura Sudduth and Alexandra Imbrosci-Viera were charming as the vain but endearing Princesses Nekaya and Kalyba.

Among the imported British “Flowers of Progress,” Logan Pitts (Mr. Goldbury), Jack F. Murphy (Lord Dramaleigh), David Auxier (Captain Sir Edward Corcoran, K.C.B.), James LaRosa (Sir Bailey Barre), and Patrick Lord-Remmert (Mr. Blushington) all acquitted themselves admirably. Their ensemble number led by King Paramount, “Society Has Quite Forsaken,” staged as a music-hall turn rather than the customary minstrel show, earned a rousing response.

Joshua Warner provided a handsome set, and Quinto Ott’s costumes were attractive, if not especially evocative of the South Seas setting.

Though Utopia, Limited has been seldom performed, I have managed to catch several productions over the years—including those by Village Light Opera Group, Light Opera of Manhattan, and Blue Hill Troupe—but this one stood out as especially satisfying.

The three-performance run was reportedly well attended; one hoped that success will encourage NYGASP to keep the work in rotation, and perhaps even tackle The Grand Duke. The following season will see the company return to more familiar territory with The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, and The Gondoliers on the roster.

(The Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College, East 68th Street; nygasp.org; April 18-19 only)

Photos by Danny Bristoli: (top) Company

Below: (l. - r.) Matthew Wages, Vince Gover, Lance Olds

Giant (The Music Box)

 By Harry Forbes

John Lithgow’s Olivier Award–winning portrayal of Roald Dahl—creator of such cherished works as James and the Giant Peach, Matilda, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory—arrives with considerable advance acclaim, and it proves entirely justified. Lithgow captures, with unnerving precision, the writer’s tangle of contradictions: genial and playful one moment, prickly and imperious the next, and shadowed throughout by the troubling specter of entrenched antisemitism.

That final aspect forms the crux of Mark Rosenblatt’s provocative drama, set during the summer of 1983, when Dahl found himself under mounting pressure from his British and American publishers to issue a public statement addressing accusations sparked by his comments on Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Dahl maintains that his critique, voiced in a review of Tony Clifton’s God Cried, was aimed solely at Israeli policy, not at Jewish people. Rosenblatt’s script keeps the question deliberately unsettled through most of the play's two acts, inviting the audience to wrestle with Dahl’s intent as much as with his impact.

Aya Cash brings initial hesitancy and then mounting urgency to Jessie Stone, the American publishing executive dispatched to secure a damage-controlling apology. Elliot Levey is equally compelling as Tom, Dahl’s British publisher, whose own Jewish identity sits nonchalantly alongside a lifetime’s encountering casual prejudice. Rachael Stirling lends warmth and steel to Felicity Crosland, Dahl’s fiancée, who believes she can manage him—until we learn she can’t.

The household staff, including David Manis’s long-serving gardener, are more than background figures. In particular, Stella Everett’s cheerful but observant housekeeper gradually emerges as a moral witness, her restraint giving way to quiet assertion.

Under Nicholas Hytner’s assured direction, the ensemble delivers finely calibrated performances, allowing the play’s arguments to unfold with clarity and tension. Bob Crowley’s detailed set—a well rendered Great Missenden home mid-renovation—grounds the action in a tangible, lived-in reality.

At the center stands Lithgow, navigating a role that demands both magnetism and repulsion. He manages that balancing act with remarkable control, never softening Dahl’s edges nor reducing him to caricature.

If, as Lithgow has suggested, this may be his final stage appearance, it serves as a fitting capstone to a distinguished career that has spanned stage, film, and television since his Tony Award–winning Broadway debut in The Changing Room in 1972. Here, he leaves the stage much as he has occupied it for decades: commanding and comple.

(Music Box Theatre, 239 W. 45th St.; gianttheplay.com; through June 28)

Photo by Joan Marcus:  John Lithgow

Dog Day Afternoon (August Wilson Theatre)

By Harry Forbes

This engrossing stage adaptation of the classic 1975 film places Jon Bernthal (The Bear) in the Al Pacino role of Sonny, a desperate, ill-fated bank robber attempting to hold up a Brooklyn Chase Manhattan Bank. At his side is his volatile accomplice Sal, played by Bernthal’s Bear co-star Ebon Moss-Bachrach, while a third partner, the jittery Ray Ray (Christopher Sears), loses his nerve and bolts almost immediately.

Pulitzer Prize winner Stephen Adly Guirgis, adapting both the film and P. F. Kluge and Thomas Moore’s Life magazine article “The Boys in the Bank” (itself based on true events), has crafted a script that proves highly effective on stage. It injects more humor than the film without sacrificing tension, and under Rupert Goold’s taut direction, the piece sustains a gripping momentum throughout.

There have been earlier stage versions—I recall a modest 2008 Off-Broadway staging by the Barefoot Theatre Company—but this production operates on an entirely different level.

Bernthal, making his Broadway debut, is onstage nearly the entire time and delivers a commanding, deeply felt performance. Moss-Bachrach, also new to Broadway, matches him with a vividly drawn Sal. The supporting cast is uniformly strong: Michael Kostroff as the beleaguered bank manager Butterman; Danny Johnson as security guard Mr. Eddy; and the bank tellers, including Elizabeth Canavan (doubling effectively as Sonny’s wife Gloria), Paola Lázaro, Wilemina Olivia-Garcia, and Andrea Syglowski; and especially Jessica Hecht, who gives a gem of a performance as the tightly wound, domineering Colleen.

Outside the bank, John Ortiz’s NYPD detective Fucco and Spencer Garrett’s FBI hardliner Sheldon -- both actors convincing -- spar over how to handle the crisis—Fucco favoring empathy, Sheldon pushing for force—adding another layer of tension to the standoff.

A standout among the supporting players is Esteban Andres Cruz as Leon, Sonny’s partner, whose desire for gender-affirming surgery provides the robbery’s emotional impetus. Their second-act phone conversation—tender, awkward, and marked by painful miscommunication—is one of the production’s most affecting moments.

David Korins’ revolving set, evocatively lit by Isabella Byrd, shifts between the bank interior and the surrounding streets, creating a vivid sense of place. Occasional action spills into the aisles, and while there’s no formal audience participation, the crowd is invited to join Sonny’s iconic cry of “Attica,” the production’s most direct nod to the film’s charged public spectacle.

Set in 1972, the production benefits from Brenda Abbandandolo’s spot-on period costumes and Guirgis’s commitment to era-authentic language, free of contemporary overlay. Goold sustains that period texture throughout. Cody Spencer’s richly detailed sound design, along with well-chosen music from David Bowie and Marvin Gaye, further enhances the atmosphere.

Some may argue that the production cannot match the film, but that misses the point. Working in a different medium, Guirgis has created a piece with its own integrity and theatrical force. Judging by the enthusiastic response at the performance I attended, audiences are more than willing to embrace it on its own terms.

(August Wilson Theatre, 245 W. 52nd Street; dogdayafternoon.com) 

Photo by Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman: (l.-r.) Jon Bernthal, Danny Johnson, Jessica Hecht

Monte Cristo (The York Theatre)

By Harry Forbes

The latest in a long line of musicals drawn from Alexandre Dumas’s endlessly adaptable 1844 novel arrives at the York Theatre Company in a handsome, well-appointed production. With polished staging and a cast of seasoned Broadway professionals—Sierra Boggess, Norm Lewis, Karen Ziemba, and Adam Jacobs among them—this Monte Cristo makes a strong initial impression.

It follows close on the heels of the recent French film and the PBS Masterpiece miniseries, joining a crowded field of adaptations stretching back to the 19th century. Among those is the version by Charles Fechter, whose work—along with Dumas’s original—serves as source material here. Composer Stephen Weiner and librettist/lyricist Peter Kellogg, who previously collaborated on Penelope, or How the Odyssey Was Written at the York, reunite for this effort. Their score is consistently pleasant and occasionally stirring, but on first hearing, only intermittently memorable.

In aiming for a Les Misérables-style sweep, however, this Monte Cristo strays too far from the spirit of its source. Most notably, it softens the novel’s moral architecture. The three conspirators—Villefort (Lewis), Fernand (Daniel Yearwood), and Danglars (James Judy)—whose betrayal condemns Edmond Dantès (Jacobs) to 18 years in the Château d’If, are here recast as remorseful figures. The shift blunts the story’s central engine: righteous vengeance.

Other alterations prove equally misguided. The scheming innkeeper Caderousse (Danny Rutigliano) and his wife Carconte (Ziemba) are reduced to broad comic relief, as if imported from a 1950s musical comedy. Rutigliano and Ziemba are undeniably entertaining, but their material belongs to a different show. Even the comic Thénardiers in Les Misérables retain their menace; here, the tonal imbalance undercuts the drama.

To be sure, Dumas’s sprawling narrative demands judicious trimming. But what has helped adaptations like Les Misérables and The Phantom of the Opera endure is not just compression, but fidelity to the emotional and moral stakes of the original. In sanding down those edges, this Monte Cristo sacrifices much of its gravitas.

Visually, though, the production is a clear success. Anne Mundell’s set, Alan C. Edwards’s lighting, and the elegant period costumes by Siena Zoë Allen and Amanda Roberge combine to create one of the most striking environments the York stage has seen in recent memory.

The performances are uniformly strong. Jacobs and Boggess bring vocal warmth and emotional conviction to the central love story, their duets among the score’s highlights. Lewis lends gravitas to Villefort, particularly in his reflective “A Great and Noble Man.” Rutigliano, despite the misjudged characterization, makes a vivid impression in his two roles, including the Abbé Faria.

At the performance reviewed, Madison Claire Parks stood out as Haydée, the young woman Dantès rescues, delivering a compelling second-act solo and a poignant duet with Boggess. The production also incorporates a queer subplot—drawn from Dumas and highlighted in recent adaptations—through Danglars’s daughter Eugénie (a spirited Kate Fitzgerald) and her attraction to Haydée.

Under Peter Flynn’s brisk direction, the narrative moves fluidly through its many episodes, supported by David Hancock Turner’s music direction and Marcos Santana’s choreography. If the storytelling ultimately lacks the weight it seeks, the production’s craft and performances still offer much to admire.

(Theatre at St. Jean’s, 150 East 76 Street; https://www.yorktheatre.org/monte-cristo-2025; though April 5)

Photo by Shawn Salley: (l.-r. Sierra Boggess, Adam Jacobs)