One of Stephen Sondheim’s most famous maxims was that a musical’s content should dictate each song’s form—in other words, the framework of the musical itself will determine what the songs should sound like. This can make taking the songs out of the full musical work challenging, since they are so intricately entwined into the musicals they come from. In creating Old Friends, a Sondheim revue running through June 15 at Manhattan Theatre Club, creator Cameron Mackintosh and director Matthew Bourne try to have it both ways. Some songs are performed as in a concert, with performers in formal dress singing directly

While any number of musicals are based on popular movies, precious few are based on documentaries. Fortunately, Saheem Ali had the wonderful idea to bring Wim Wender’s 1999 documentary Buena Vista Social Club to the stage. After a run at Atlantic Theater Company in late 2023, the celebration of Cuban music and history has come to Broadway. The musical’s (rather thin) story evokes the melodrama of classic telenovelas, with a romance that is star-crossed by class divisions and a passionate artist who must choose between creating music for the world or for her own community. In 1959, as revolution sweeps across

If Lincoln Center's revival of Anton Chekhov's Uncle Vanya feels both timely and timeless, we can thank playwright and actress Heidi Schreck for her smart adaptation of the 1898 classic. With no references to anything that would place the story in a particular time or place (money is referred to as dollars, people reference “calling” each other rather than “calling on” someone), the play becomes universal—and all the more poignant. In Schreck’s hands, the lengthy Russian names become Anglicized and more approachable for American audiences—Aleksandr is now Alexander and Yelena is Elena, for example. But Ivan is still affectionately called Vanya

Peter Morgan has written any number of excellent plays, movies and TV series about world leaders, from Richard Nixon to Idi Amin to Queen Elizabeth II. But Patriots, his latest piece directed by Rupert Goold and running through June 23 the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, does not carry the same weight as Frost/Nixon, The Last King of Scotland or The Audience (or The Queen, or The Crown for that matter). It’s not that the story doesn’t have grand ambitions, but Patriots does not quite reach its goals. The play follows Boris Berezovsky, a former mathematician whose love of numbers makes him a

We all knew the musical adaptations of The Great Gatsby would be coming as soon as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 book entered the public domain, and the first of what will inevitably be many such productions is finally open at the Broadway Theater. And much like Jay Gatsby’s signature parties, the new musical is very flashy and bright and loud but there’s not an awful lot underneath. Jason Howland and Nathan Tysen’s score is full of bright pop songs that don’t really evoke the 1920s or the wild hedonism of pre-Depression New York. The songs are fine but not terribly memorable,