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Today on Broadway: Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025
00:15:45
‘Liberation’ Broadway reviews; Tilda Swinton, Gary Oldman, ‘John Proctor’ in Royal Court’s season; Klena and Rodriguez to lead ‘A Beautiful Mind’ developmental concert Since 2016, “Today on Broadway” has been the first and only daily podcast recapping ...
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Welcome to Today on Broadway for Wednesday, October 29, 2025. I'm Broadway Radio's Matt Tammanini and I'm.
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Tell Me on a Sunday podcast, Grace.
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Hockey Grace we are coming to folks a little bit later than normal in Patreon because we waited for the reviews for Liberation as it opened on Broadway on Tuesday night over at the James Earl Jones Theater. As we've talked about, this is a remounting of an Off Broadway run from earlier this year that was highly critically acclaimed, award nominated, all of those types of things, and unsurprisingly, it looks like the very same thing is happening during the Broadway run. It is currently scheduled to play through January 11th. And before we dive into the reviews themselves, as a reminder, it is written by Bess Wol and directed by Whitney White, and the entire Off Broadway company made the transition over to Broadway. The show is led by Susanna Flood as Lizzie. Also in the company are Betsy Adam, Audrey Corsa, Kayla Davion, Kristalyn Lloyd, Irene Sofia Luccio, Charlie Thurston and Adina Verson. The play is set in the 1970s in the Great state of Ohio, where Lizzie gathers a group of women to talk about changing their lives and the world. What follows is a necessary, messy and bitingly funny exploration of what it means to be free and to be a woman. In the show, Lizzie's daughter steps into her mother's memory, into the unfinished revolution she once helped ignite, and searches the past to find the answer for herself. Now, since this show has already been reviewed, it's the same production. I'm not going to dive too deeply into all of these reviews. But of course, if you would like to read more of these and other reviews, I will have both the Did They Like It? Roundup and the Broadway World Roundup in the show notes. But let's start with the New York Times, where Elizabeth Vincentelli made the show a New York Times critics pick. She said, quote, if there is a show that can make the case for a Tony Award for Best ensemble, it's this one. White directs the actors like a conductor leading an orchestra. Each one gets to shine in at least one aria or speech in this case, but they also function as a multifaceted single organism on stage. When these women talk, we want to hear every, every word. Aramini Tamubu, writing for Variety, said, quote, it can be challenging to deliver something fresh and unique to the memory play genre. However, in writer Bess Wall's new Broadway show Liberation, she manages to do just that. Emilyn Travis of Entertainment Weekly was Also positive, saying, quote, liberation might not be able to answer life's difficult questions, but it knows that it's important to foster these conversations and to come together to try our best to make the world a better place, especially when history often seems hellbent, repeating itself. And we'll wrap up with Matt Winman of AM New York saying, quote, in Liberation, best Wolves daring and deeply analytical new play, the act of exposure is both literal and intellectual. Wool strips away nostalgia and ideology to examine how the 1970s women's liberation movement reshaped lives, where it fell short, and what its legacy means today. She's less interested in celebrating the past than in interrogating it, probing questions of identity, sacrifice and progress with the precision of a social scientist and the empathy of. Of a dramatist Grace. Again, we knew how highly acclaimed this show was off Broadway, but I do think it's important to remember that we've seen a lot of really good Off Broadway shows that people loved. Make the transition to Broadway and lose something, either because of the bigger stakes or anticipation for the show was so high that it can't meet the expectations. But it seems like Liberation, in this newer incarnation has been able to maintain all of the hype and all of the positives that it saw off Broadway. And it sounds like this is going to be a run that is not only going to excite audiences, but also despite the fact that it's scheduled to close in January, very well could be remembered when Tony season comes next spring.
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Yeah, I mean, this was the hope, right? Was when you bring a critically acclaimed Off Broadway play, you have to hope that the translation to a larger stage and audience size is still just as impactful. And I think that it's just like tooting every horn for Whitney White to be able to have transferred that in such a great, intimate way, especially at the James Earl Jones, where the setting is, you know, a rec room. That's really hard to do. And I'm really, really glad that it's still resonating for audiences.
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All right, let's move from Broadway over to London, where we got the announcement of the Royal Court Theater's 70th anniversary season. And it is packed with not only stars, but major performances having their London debut. The big takeaway is the fact that Tilda Swinton is returning to the stage for the first time in more than 35 years in a role that she is reprising for the first time since 1988. It will be Manfred Karg's man to Man, a solo show in which she will reunite with the original director Steven Unwin. The production will begin at the royal court on September 5th of next season. That is 2020 and then it is scheduled to move to an Off Broadway theater in spring of 2027. Also in the season will be a stage return for one of my favorites, Gary Oldman. He is currently getting ready to wrap up season five of Slow Horses today on Apple tv. If you're listening to this in the regular feed, the season finale is already up. But he is going to return to the stage to not only star in but also direct a run of Craps Tape, a show that recently played Off Broadway as well. It is going to run for a limited four week engagement beginning on May 8th. And then another part of the season that is incredibly exciting is the fact that Kimberly Belflower's Tony nominated show John Proctor is the Villain will make its London debut again. Directed by Donya Taymor as it was on Broadway, the show will begin performances on March 20th of next year. And no word necessarily on who is going to perform in that show, but it is planning make the transfer to the West End, apparently according to Baz Bama Boy, after its run at the Royal Court. There is more stuff in the Royal Court season, but those are the three headlines. Tilda Swinton, Gary Oldman, John Proctor is the Villain. That sounds like a season of must see shows over in London. Grace.
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I'm really excited but very curious about how the transfer of John Proctor. I think that it's such an inherently southern and then American play and especially with like the subject matter and how we deal with certain things. And like I'm just so curious about how that will transfer or translate rather to UK audiences. But I'm certainly excited about it. I mean it's just such a dream of a production to have done that. So congratulations to everybody.
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All right, coming back across the pond, Grace, we now have the full cast of the upcoming Manhattan Concert Productions Broadway series staging of Jane Eyre. That'll happen at David Geffen hall at Lincoln center on February 15th of next year. We already knew that Erica Henningsen and Ramin Karimlou were going to lead that production. Now we know that the cast is also going to star Caroline Bowman, David Michael Gary, Ellen Harvey, Mark Kudish and Richard Mason, along with Emily Skinner and Elizabeth Stanley. The concert will be directed by Tony Yazbeck who has starred in a couple of these productions for MCP in his own right. All right, let's dive into last week's Broadway grosses and in total, Broadway remained steady at 32 shows on the board. Grosses were down about a little over a million dollars, coming at 36,970,592 bucks. Attendance was essentially flat, coming in at $277,251 and down about $4.15 for an average ticket price of $133.35. Up at the top of the grosses ladder again was Hamilton, coming in at $3,447,283. Next was Wicked at just over $2 million. The Lion King was at 1.88 million. Chess was in fourth place at $1,858,874. But in just seven performances, so it continues to climb up that ladder. Anticipation is hot for this one. It'll be interesting to see what that looks like when it does have a full eight playing week. And then rounding out the top five was waiting for Godot at a little bit over 1.8 million. The rest of the shows, north of seven figures in descending order are Art, Mamma Mia, Just In Time, death becomes her, M.J. ragtime, oh Mary, Buena Vista Social Club, maybe Happy Ending and Aladdin Liberation, as we just talked about, was at the other end of the scale, coming in at $245,942. Obviously. Hopefully these reviews will help that one find its audience and continue to increase those numbers to give it a healthy run. In total, of Broadway's 32 currently running productions, 18 played to 90% or more. Wicked, Waiting for Godot and Ragtime were all at 100%. Hamilton was at 101.32 and just in time came in at 103.41%. All right, Grace, let's head over to some show and casting news and let's start over at the Signature Theater, where the return engagement of Heather Christians Oratorio for Living Things has been extended. It has added an extra week and will now run through November 23rd. Also off Broadway, in the upcoming New York premiere of Jennifer Black Mirror's show predictor, Tony nominee Caitlin Kinnanan will star as inventor Meg Crane. Performances are set to begin on December 6th off Broadway at the AMT Theater with an opening night for December 14th and a run through January 18th. And then, rounding out some news Off Broadway, it was announced that the New York Theater Workshop production of Tartuffe, starring a who's who company led by Matthew Broderick as well as Francis Zhu, Ryan, J. Haddad, Lisa Crone, Emily Davis, Amber Gray, Bianca Del Rio, David Cross and more, has been Extended yet again. The run will begin performances on November 28th, and it will now play all the way through January 24th of next year, directed by Sarah Benson. Now, Grace, we had talked about a musical adaptation of A Beautiful Mind, and we didn't exactly know when it was going to be kind of coming to the stage, but yesterday we got information because there's going to be a concert version of it out in Indianapolis coming up In November, on November 21, as part of the Discovering Broadway series. What's interesting is that it seems like this is a pretty stacked cast, at least in terms of the leads. Starring in the concert will be Derek Klena as Dr. John Nash and Krista Rodriguez as Alicia Nash. Again, this one is from the team of Sarah Trim, who is doing the book, and Zoe Sarnack writing the score. As the movie buff that you are, Grace, Derek Klena, Krystal Rodriguez, how do you feel about them in those two roles?
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Leading A Beautiful Mind, it's so beautifully random. I could not have ever in my wildest dreams said, if they're going to adapt that musical, I'm going to them first. But I don't think that they would have not been on that list, you know what I'm saying? Like, I think there's two fabulously talented individuals. It is kind of like, I think in this moment in time, I'm kind of in this funny place of like, it's like, you know, the fun mad libs of, like, incredibly talented people existing. IP Everyone, like, rolls the dice a little bit and then they go, okay, here it is. And I'm like, you know what? Yeah, I love it. Like, it's going to be great. And I'm so curious to hear that music. I know writers are so phenomenally talented as well, and you're just lucky to have either Derek or Krista singing your score in any capacity, whatever it is. So I'm really curious and I wonder if Anthony Rapp will also be in this one. You know, he could make a crossover to be in both the film and the musical. And I'm just saying put it out there.
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And Austin Pendleton as well. Austin Pendleton is currently off Broadway with a show that he wrote. He was in the film. He could come back as well. In the original film, in these roles, as John Nash was Russell Crowe and Alicia Nash was played by Jennifer Connelly. So, yeah, I don't know who I would say, like, oh, these people were who I would have picked. Obviously, we don't know the score, so we don't know exactly, like, what vocal types or anything or what type of music that they're looking for. But this is definitely not necessarily who I would have had in mind, but also not not who I would have had in mind. So it's certainly an interesting combination and we'll see what happens with it next. Moving over to some touring stuff, Yesterday it was announced that Emmy Award winner and stage regular Richard Thomas will be picking up the mantle of Mark Twain ton and taking it on the road to 45 cities. It actually started earlier this week in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which I didn't realize that was going to be happening. This show was originally written and performed by the late great Hal Holbrooke and Richard Thomas is currently the only actor that is authorized to do this show, which is kind of a huge deal because Hal Holbrooke did this show for decades. So if you want more information on where Richard Thomas is going to be doing the show, we will have that in the show notes. All right. And two real quick bits of news here, Grace. Yesterday over at the Shubert Theater it was announced that Jessica Vosk and Philip Johnson Richardson will be wrapping up their runs in hell's kitchen on November 30th. Jessica Vosk currently playing Jersey and Philip Johnson Richardson playing Nuck. So they will wrap up those runs and then Tank Dural, Tank Babs will do a short encore run to wrap up Jessica Vosk's tenure in the show from November 18th through the 30th. Stepping into the role of Jersey will be Kelsey Kimmel. She is currently the standby for Vosk as Jersey and actually who I saw when I saw when I went to the production a couple weeks ago. So she is going to be with the show through January 11th and Lamont Walker Jr will take over as Nuck beginning on December 2nd. It and then friend of the show, Mary Lou Henner is going to be part of a new 29 hour invitation only reading of a musical sequel to like a Pretty well known show that was originally written by former Broadway radio guest Gretchen Crier. This new show is a sequel to I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road. This one is called Still Getting My Act Together. Cryer wrote the book and lyrics and Nancy Ford wrote the music. Mary Lou is going to be starring opposite Peter Gallagher, Issy Van Randwick, Jennifer Lee Warren, David Ippolito and Piper Gudev. So this one is going to be happening on November 7th. So if you want more information about that, we will have it in the show notes. All right, Grace, that's all that we have for today. Thanks for listening to Today on Broadway. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. BroadwayRadio. If you want more Broadway radio, head over to Patreon.com BroadwayRadio Grace. Where can people find you?
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You can find me at Grace. Hockey.
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All right, everybody, have a wonderful Wednesday. We'll be back to talk to you tomorrow.