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MickeyJoTheatre
What to see on BROADWAY in 2025 | Mickey-Jo's guide to the plays and musicals of the New York theatre season
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Mickey Jo
The thing is, there are so many brilliant shows on Broadway telling so many important stories, featuring so many extraordinarily talented performers. How could you possibly choose between them? Oh wait, like this. Oh my God. Hey, welcome back to my theatre themed YouTube channel. Or hello to you if you're listening on podcast platforms. My name is Mickey Jo and I am obsessed with all things theatre. I am a professional theatre critic here on social media as well as a theatrical content creator and pundit and today we're are going to be together talking through the rest of the Broadway season. Yes, this is your Broadway guide to spring 2025. If you are planning a trip between now and the middle of the year, basically which show should you be considering? We're going to talk about the upcoming shows, those that recently opened as well as the long running ones that it may be worth returning to. The last time I was in New York was November of 2024 where I had a chance to review a handful of the ongoing shows. If you're curious what I thought about those, feel free to look up those reviews wherever you encountered this and as always, make share your own thoughts and feelings about the current Broadway season, upcoming shows and which musicals and plays people should be considering right now in the comments section down below. In the meantime, I don't want to waste any more of your time. Let's dive right in to Broadway in 2025, beginning with the new productions for this season which opened already and are still running, including O Mary at the Lyceum Theatre. This has been one of the hottest tickets of the season so far. It's this anarchic queer comedy from the brilliant and twisted mind of Cole Escola. The interesting thing about this is that Cole has left as the show's star and Betty Gilpin has replaced them in the role of Mary Todd Lincoln. I'm very intrigued to see how this plays with a new cast of performers. But as brilliantly maniacal as Cole's performance was, the writing has always been the most celebrated thing about this play. So I dare say it's going to go on to have continued Broadway success and it's great that it's able to outlive its creator, Cole Escola. So definitely go and see this one if you're looking for something hysterically funny in New York this spring. But it's not the only comedy in town. There's also Death Becomes her at the Luntfontanne Theatre. I saw this in previews. I did not have chance to review it because I was a little too early in the show's run. I did think it was so deliciously campy, hysterically funny. Some of the most I had smiled and laughed during any of my Broadway trips. In 2024, Megan Hilty and Jennifer Simard are both giving the most fantastic diva performances with some wonderful players in the supporting cast as well. I think it's better than the movie. I hope to be able to go and see this again this year so that I can properly review it for you here. But it's a show that is exactly as fun and as funny as you are expecting. It's perfected the formula that the Addams Family on Broadway was kind of to find that Beetlejuice then got right, but was sort of a little ahead of its time for it feels like audiences are now a little more ready for that kind of irreverent humor and Death Becomes her is doing very nicely. There Is also A Wonderful World, the Louis Armstrong musical. I recently shared my thoughts about this one. It's running at Studio 54. James Monroe Iglehart, Tony Award winner, plays the iconic jazz musician through the extent of his professional life and through his four different marriages and his time spent in four completely different cities, beginning in New Orleans, traveling to Chicago, to Hollywood, finally to New York. I think this musical finds a way of putting joy on stage alongside telling a very important story. I think it's a wonderful time. If you like this kind of a show. Then There is Jamie Lloyd's revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard, running at the St. James Theatre. Truly the buzziest, the most talked about show on Broadway right now. Enduringly, even beyond the opening of Gypsy, this is still the show that everyone is talking about. Whether it's Nicole Scherzinger's barnstorming central performance as Norma Desmond that has people talking Tony Awards, or whether it's the bold and innovative concept for the production itself that does away with all its former grandeur. No turbans, no staircases, no dying monkeys to be seen. Instead, it is a bare stage save for an enormous screen onto which camera footage from onstage cameras is relayed. If you are at all interested in keeping up with Broadway, this is must see theatre. If somehow you haven't seen this production yet, see it just to form your own opinion of it. It has still proved a little bit divisive, but I think it's doing some of the most creative and exciting and thrilling work in musical theatre revivals right now. Now closing on February 2nd at the James Earl Jones Theatre is a play called left on 10th star Peter Gallagher Julianna Margulies and some dogs. There are dogs in this play. Everybody. Call me simple minded, but that's enough to get me excited. This is from Delia Ephron. In fact, it's based on her memoir and it talks a lot about second chances later in life and love and hope. I did not take the opportunity to see this when it was suggested to me that again, this would be perfect for you if this felt like you're kind of a genre, perhaps for an older audience. There's also the newly arrived Cult of Love at the Hayes Theatre. A starry cast navigate a contentious family drama set during the festive period. It's a one act play. It's written by Leslie Headland. Zachary Quinto and Shailene Woodley are among the cast. It talks about those things which bring a family together as well as those things which separate them. Think August Osage county built the Christmas Tree. I haven't seen it, but that's the impression I'm getting of this play, which I like the sound of that personally. That's just me now. Still running, I believe at the Circle in the Square Theatre is Sam Gold's production of Romeo and Juliet with starry lead casting. Rachel Zegler and Kit Connor star as the star crossed young lovers in a very contemporary, contemporary and Gen Z coded new production that puts their youthfulness and their glee and their euphoria and their naive love for each other center stage. It's a dynamic and an exciting and a very contemporary production that speaks very well, I think, to young audiences. If you are a Shakespearean connoisseur, then you may recognize that this production does not necessarily contend with the full depth of the material and this historic tension of the grudge between these households and, you know, the darkness and the weight of the thing. But for it to be the 1000th spin on Romeo and Juliet, I think it's an incredibly creative production that has a lot to say specifically to a younger crowd who may be seeing Shakespeare for the very first time. Also, not for nothing, you will realize what a starkit Connor is. My favorite new musical on Broadway over at the Belasco Theatre may be Happy Ending tells the story of two robots who go on a road trip together. If the name Michael Arden means anything to you, then you will know a little element of why this is so special. He is the musical's director, Darren Criss and Helen J. Shen star and it's extraordinarily charming. It's the most utterly beautiful and enchanting show. It feels not like a traditional Broadway musical in the jazz hand sense, but more like something with the sensibility of a Pixar or studio Ghibli film. It's utterly moving, completely transcendent and just small enough to tell this perfectly contained story that also speaks to many different facets of the human experience. I cannot recommend this one enough. This is my number one recommendation of a show to see on Broadway right now. Then here she is, boys. Here she is, world. Audra McDonald stars in Gypsy, which recently opened at the Majestic Theatre and this is a no brainer for me. This is the most decorated musical theatre performer in Broadway history. She has won more Tony Awards for acting than any other actor has in the history of the Tony Awards, taking on one of the most celebrated and iconic roles in one of the greatest book musicals ever written. Kudos to you Julie Stein, Stephen Sondheim and Arthur Lawrence. You knocked it out of the park with that one. There's also the small matter of the brilliant supporting cast around her. But you have to go and see Audra ji Gypsy on Broadway. How could you possibly not? Even if you don't necessarily think it's the most obvious piece of casting, even if you don't think it's going to be the performance of her career, it still needs to be seen. I have not seen this one yet, much as it pains me, but you know, as soon as I have, I will be sharing my thoughts with you right here. There is also Eureka Day, presented by the Manhattan Theatre Club at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre. This is a play by Jonathan Spector, set at a liberal Californian school. They're dealing with an unexpected outbreak of the mumps and this forces them to make a decision about the school's equally liberal vaccine policy and puts them in a difficult position. It has recently been extended amidst great word of mouth to mid February. It's currently scheduled to close on February 16th. It features a brilliant small cast including the likes of Jessica Hecht and Amber Gray. I didn't catch this one when it had a different production here in London, but I've been hearing great things. So that is everything, which was already open. Here are all of the upcoming shows in chronological order. Now, the first of the next shows on Broadway is going to be English. This has already started previews at the Todd Haimes Theatre. It has an official opening night scheduled for January 23rd and it tells the story of a group of Iranian people coming together to learn English. This is a Pulitzer Prize winning play which is a huge accolade. It's written by Sanaz Toosi who I believe is making their Broadway debut with this piece. It was recently produced in another different production here in the UK by the Royal Shakespeare Company, which I was devastated to have missed. I have heard great things about this. I've heard that it's funny and affecting and the particular device that they use in order to distinguish between characters speaking English as a second language and speaking their own native language, which you still hear as English, I have heard is pretty brilliant. This definitely feels like it's going to be one of the big contenders this year for the Tony Award for Best New Play. The next show which will be opening on Broadway, will be Redwood down at the Nederlander Theatre, Auspicious because Idina Menzel is starring in it and she is returning to the Nederlander where she made her Broadway debut in of course, Rent. Scheduled to begin its first Preview performance on the 24th of January with an official opening night of February 13th, this stars Dina Menzel in a musical about a woman escaping her life to discover the mysterious world of redwood trees. That's as much as I know about it. So far it has had a regional run and La Jolla Playhouse. It's written by Kate Diaz and Tina Landau. It feels like it has shades of the if then about it, but Idina Menzel is coming back to Broadway in another star vehicle for her and you would assume as well that it's going to speak to people with that similar kind of a life experience. You know, potentially the generation that grew up with her with Rent who are now of a similar age then Beginning previews on February 15th with an official opening night set for March 20th is Operation Mincemeat. The much anticipated Broadway transfer of the West End hit from Spit Lip Theatre, currently playing at the West End's Fortune Theatre and doing very, very well, based on extraordinary word of mouth that they have spent years cultivating with these many runs at smaller off West End and fringe venues. Operation Mincemeat is this winningly hilarious and plucky and brilliantly smart story of a group of MI5 agents hatching an elaborate and bizarre scheme to try and convince enemy forces during World War II that they were going to be deploying their troops in a different location than they were actually planning to. It's the true story of a deception mission with unbelievable factual details brought charmingly to the stage with five performers multi rolling as a bunch of different characters throwing on these different hats. It has a similar sort of a sensibility to something like the play that goes Wrong, but with moments of heartbreaking Sentimentality that will really get to you. It is at once utterly silly and incredibly intelligent. This is a huge recommendation from me. It's an Olivier Award winning best new musical, one of the most exciting and brilliant things I had seen in years when I first watched it. Please, please go and see this on Broadway. It's a plucky little show that deserves your support. I promise you that you will laugh. I promise you that you will cry and you will not see it coming. Oh, and it's at the Golden Theatre, by the way. Then, from a show I know everything about to a show I know nothing about. Buena Vista Social Club. This is opening on March 19th. That's its official opening night, but beginning previews on February 21st. And we are going to learn about this together in real time. This one is based on a film. It's about a band or it's based on an album. It's based on an album by the Buena Vista Social Club who are a band, a Cuban band, it seems. It makes sense then that the musical is set in Havana. It spans the time from the 1950s to the 1990s, following the lives of these musicians and the effect that communism and the rise of Fidel Castro had on musicians at the time. My goodness. Certainly I'm interested in this show. I get why people are excited about this one. This had a successful Off Broadway run. It's now going to be transferring to the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre. And it's one of the many shows eyeing up the Tony Award for Best New Musical this year. Tony Award voters love a great story and this sounds like it has one. Then more Shakespeare is coming in the form of Othello, which is heading to the Barrymore Theatre with Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal starring as Othello and Iago. Now let's talk about the casting for Othello, because Denzel Washington, we all know, is going to be giving this masterful performance. Jake Gyllenhaal, I am prepared to be surprised by this was not casting that immediately made sense to me because we don't often see Iago portrayed by these charismatic, handsome leading men types. He is more often insidious and slimy and sort of has this resentment stemming from his own inadequacies. But believe it or not, the casting I am most excited about here is the West End's own Molly Osbourne, who will be joining these two Hollywood stars to play the role of Desdemona. And the story behind her casting is an interesting one, as the tale goes. Director Kenny Leon was specifically searching for untapped star quality that could contend with the likes of Gyllenhaal and Washington. And not only did Molly Osbourne's name come highly recommended by the West End theatre industry, she was most recently seen opposite Jamie Parker in the pre West End version of the Curious Case of Benjamin Button. But her self tape audition was said to have been so convincing it won over not only Kenny Leon but also both of her future co stars. And I am very excited about this. Not just because I think it's thrilling to see a West End performer flying the flag for the British theatre industry alongside these Hollywood titans, but also because the performance she gave in the Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which I was lucky enough to see, had such conviction and streng strength behind this pain and this fragility that it seems likely we are going to see a fascinating portrait of Desdemona here. Given any of those qualities, I think she might just surprise audiences as one of the highlights of this production, Othello Begins previews on February 24th with an official opening night of March 23rd. Then the next play at the Hayes Theatre is one of my most anticipated of the entire season. And if you loved last season's Appropriate, you may feel the same way because this is from the same writer, Brandon Jacobs Jenkins. Beginning previews on February 25th with an official opening night of March 17th. This is Purpose. It's going to be directed by two time Tony Award winner Felicia Richard. When the youngest son of the influential Jasper family, Nazareth returns home to Illinois with an uninvited friend in tow, the family is forced into a reckoning with itself, its faith and the legacies of black radicalism. Spirited, hilarious and filled with intrigue, it's Brandon Jacobs Jenkins. How could it not be? Purpose is an epic family drama from one of the country's most celebrated voices. I am excited about this show and you should be as well. Then scheduled to begin previews on March 10th with an official opening night a couple of weeks later on March 31st. I'm going to try and get myself excited for the Broadway return of Glengarry Glen Ross. I am no huge fan of David Mamet, but if you are, then surely you're going to want to go and see this. This is, to his credit, another Pulitzer Prize winning play with an exciting cast. Kieran Culkin of Succession, Bob Odenkirk and Bill Burr will be starring. It's at the Palace Theatre. If you didn't see Tammy Faye or any of the concert presentations there, it's A good excuse to go and see the beautifully remodeled Palace Theatre, which has elevated from its original altitude, I guess. And I suppose it's an essential part of the theatrical education to go and see at least one David Mamet play. I have never seen Glengarry Glen Ross on stage. I have seen other David Mamet work before and you know, I've read enough about him to feel a certain type of way about it. But I am likely to be putting that aside and will hope to catch this this season. If nothing else, I'm sure the performances will be brilliant. And speaking of performances and speaking of succession, stars starting previews on the very same day and opening just a few nights earlier with an official opening night of March 27th is the picture of Dorian Gray. This is an Australian production of Oscar Wilde's classic story, which has previously run in Sydney, subsequently in the West End at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. I have reviewed it previously if you want to know what I thought. It is transferring to the Music Box Theatre on Broadway. Starring Sarah Snook as every single character. This is a one person adaptation of the Picture of Dorian Gray. Essentially, she just kind of reads through the novella and narrates it and takes on every character. What makes this special is the way that it's staged and it's quite ingenious. If you're not a fan of cameras on stage, you're definitely not going to like this one. This makes Sunset Boulevard's use of cameras look moderate. We have many cameras, many members of stage management running around helping to engineer this feat of performance and theatrical storytelling. As Sarah Snook is superimposed in conversations with herself as she is editing her own facial features in real time, telling the story all about, you know, craving the impossible eternity of youth. It is a theatrical feat with some award winning design elements. And, you know, we're seeing more and more uses of cameras on stage and this is an essential part of that conversation. I feel, I don't know that it is always to the show's benefit. A couple of specific choices I thought felt a little bit detrimental, but it's a staggering performance and it's a brilliant conceived production. Again, it has to be seen. Then beginning previews on March 11th with an official opening night scheduled for April 5th is something a little less radical and a little more joyous. I'm talking about the new musical Boop, which will star Jasmine Amy Rogers, Rising star Jasmine Amy Rogers in a breakthrough leading role as the iconic Betty Boop. What little I know about the plot seems to feel a little bit familiar of the Barbie movie that this is Betty, you know, traveling to the real world. But I'm excited about this because I think it feels colorful and vibrant and joyous and new. And who better than director Jerry Mitchell to bring that kind of a story to the stage? With plenty of flashy choreography, Jasmine Amy Rogers seems by all accounts to be an incredible young performer. The score features music by David Foster and lyrics by Susan Birkenhead, with a book by Bob Martin. These are all impressive names. I am looking forward to. Boop boop boop a doop. And another show beginning previews on that same date, March 11, but opening slightly later on April 10, is smash. This is going to be at the Broadhurst Theatre, and it adapts, of course, the beloved NBC series, which took a look at the process of casting, building and staging a successful Broadway musical based on the life of the equally iconic Marilyn Monroe. Now, I call this an adaptation because it does seem from the show's public workshops to be a slightly different interpretation of the story. We have different characters, we have a different narrative. It will be recognisable. It will feature, of course, much of the same iconic music created by Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman for the series. It features a fantastic cast of Broadway fan favorites, including the remarkably talented Robin Herder, including the Broadway return of Krysta Rodriguez, who played a different character in Smash, the TV series. There's a lot to be excited about if you are a Smash fan, even though it is largely different and I'm hoping that they've made smart choices in adapting it. They're really focusing on the comedy angle. It seems like it's leaning a little towards the idea of something like the iconic backstage comedy Noises off, and I feel like that's to the show's benefit. I'm excited to hear these songs again in a live theatrical setting. I think there's a lot they can do with this concept and with this material. I'm rooting for Smash this season. I really am. Now, if you've enjoyed being starstruck this season, if you were starstruck by Robert Downey Jr. And Starstruck by Denzel and Jake, and you were starstruck by all of the people in Glengarry Glen Ross, get ready to be starstruck once again, because at the Winter Garden Theatre, George Clooney will be starring in Goodnight and Good Luck. That begins previews on 12 March with an opening night set for 3 April. Clooney is also a co writer with Grant Hesloff it's directed by David Cromer and it's an electrifying stage adaptation of the critically acclaimed film, which I have not seen because I'm too busy trying to see all of the shows every Broadway season. Gosh darn it. I mean, I probably wasn't when. When the film came out. Was I live when the film came out? I don't know. Here's the synopsis we'll learn together. Tune in to the golden age of broadcast journalism and Edward R. Murrow's legendary history altering on air showdown with Senator Joseph McCarthy. As McCarthyism casts a shadow over America, Murrow and his team at CBS choose to confront the growing tide of paranoia and propaganda, even if it means turning the federal government and a worried nation against them. Wouldn't be the first play this season to explore some of those themes. Truthfully, it's an era which seems to often intersect with the focus of the American play, so I think that alone makes this very compelling viewing. I think the premise sounds a little stronger than the likes of McNeill, which I didn't see but did not hear good things about. Obviously, George Clooney's presence is going to make this a hot ticket, but right now I am cautiously optimistic for its artistic success as well. Then a show I would love to tell you I'm looking forward to, but I'm just so confused by what the heck it is. I'm talking about the Broadway debut technically of Jason Robin Brown's musical the Last Five Years, this iconic contemporary musical theatre song cycle that was written so many years ago, I don't even know if we can call it contemporary musical theatre anymore. This was early 2000s musical theatre lore. This was history. This was everything. When Norbert, Leo Butts and Cherie Renee Scott did this off Broadway, it has been revived since everywhere around the world. It's been on film, but it's now for the first time going to be produced on Broadway. Starring. Here's the weird bit. Nick Jonas and Adrienne Warren. She's remarkably talented. He's Nick Jonas. I'm not entirely sure what we're doing here. He neither makes sense for the role from a character perspective nor really from a vocal perspective. But he is going to do what? Sell tickets? It's beginning previews on the 18th of March and opens on the 6th of April. I can't remember if I told you that already because honestly, I'm just so baffled, and not even just by the casting. Here's where it gets weird. The brilliant creative team. It's going to be directed by Whitney White. That's incredibly exciting. Jason. Robert Brown is, as he often is, involved musically in the process. I think they just announced today, in fact, I got a press release talking about the fact there were going to be new orchestrations. The thing that surprises me is it's going to have choreography by Geoff and Rick Cooperman, whose work was most recently seen in the Outsiders. And having seen the last five years, having been in the last five years, I can't begin to work out how to tell you where or why this show needs choreography by such exciting creatives. To have even one choreographer on the last five years is a surprise. To have two feels astonishing. It's at the Hudson Theatre and we're gonna move on because I could be here all day. March 20th is when John Proctor, as the villain, begins performances, I believe, at the Booth Theatre with an official opening night scheduled for April 14th. Sadie Sink is going to star. Sadie Sink of Netflix's Stranger Things. It is apparently a bitingly funny new play from Kimberly Bellflower. The people I trust the most in the world when it comes to exciting new American drama, love this and are thrilled about this coming to Broadway. It's directed by Tony award winner Danya Taymor. Speaking of the Outsiders, it captures a generation in mid transformation. Running on pop music, optimism and fury and discovering that their future is not bound by the past. This feels like it's going to be very vital, very urgent, very contemporary. Speaking to young people. At a high school in a rural town in Georgia, an English class is studying the Crucible. But the students are more preoccupied with navigating young love, sex ed and a few school scandals. Oh, I like this already. As they delve into the American classic, the students begin to question the players perspective and the validity of naming John Proctor the show's hero. A play about picking apart these preconceived notions in older texts. I'm here for this, this. I'm excited. And you know what? Tear the tag off of this. Recycle that receipt because I'm buying it. Then beginning previews on March 25th with an official opening night of April 8th at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre is Stephen Sondheim's Old Friends, produced by the Manhattan Theatre Club and Daryl Roth and Sir Cameron Mackintosh. This was a glitzy review here in London. It was a charming and lovely evening celebrating Stephen Sondheim. I do wonder if this is going to play a little differently in New York. Not that Sondheim isn't beloved there, but just because there have been more brilliant Sondheim shows recently than we had had in the run up to this. Arriving in London, we were kind of really starved of good Sondheim. It features a wonderful cast of performers led by who else? Bernadette Peters and Lea Salonga. What I always say about this show is it's a great mixture of everything you always knew Bernadette could do and she's been doing for years, and you've always wanted to see her do on stage if you didn't have the joy of seeing her do it beforehand, which I will, which I dare say many New Yorkers did, and everything you never knew Lea Salonga could do. She is giving you Rose from Gypsy, she is giving you Mrs. Lovett from Sweeney Todd, and both will convince you that we need to revive each of those shows right now just so she can play the role. It features many more performers alongside and like previous reviews, like Sondheim on Sondheim and Putting It Together and Side by Side by Sondheim. It's a charming evening of brilliant Sondheim classics alongside some lesser sung songs, but very joyfully and classily put together. If you're any kind of a Sondheim fan, obviously you have to go and see this now. Don't hate me, but I know very little about Floyd Collins. This is heading to Lincoln Center Theatre on March 27th. That's when it begins previews opening officially on April 21st. Jeremy Jordan has been announced to star, which I hear is slightly surprising casting. I do know that it's a very celebrated Adam Gettle score which Jeremy Jordan presumably is going to sing the hell out of. It also features book, additional lyrics and direction for this production by Tina Landau. This, much like with the last five years, is this show's long awaited Broadway debut. Even though it was written just over three decades ago, I believe this has been around for quite a while. It's based on the true story of a cave explorer in Kentucky, 1925. While chasing a dream of fame and fortune, he became trapped 200ft underground alone. But for sporadic contact with the outside world, including his brother Homer, he fights for his sanity and ultimately his life. Jamie Jordan will be joined in this production by the brilliant Jason Gauthay, Sean Alan Krill, Mark Kudish, Wade McCollum, Jessica Malaski, Taylor Trench, and in her Broadway debut, Lizzie McAlpine. This again is not all singing, all dancing, jazz hands, joyous. I believe this has a lot more weight and darkness to it. Listen, it's Adam Guettle, but the real musical theatre connoisseurs and aficionados, this is the one that they're excited about. Then we have just in time. Now, they recently announced some additional casting. This is another jukebox musical, another bio jukebox musical about Bobby Darin. Jonathan Groff is starring. Jonathan Groff, last season's Tony Award winner for best leading actor in a musical. Can he do it two seasons in a row? Well, we've seen it happen before with these jukebox bio shows. This is going to be at Circle in the Square after Romeo and Juliet finishes. It Begins previews on March 28, officially opening on April 23. It's developed and directed by Tony Award winner Alex Timbers, whose work is currently seen on Broadway in Moulin Rouge. If you have no idea who Bobby Darin is, think of songs like Mack the Knife and beyond the Sea. I'm excited to see Jonathan Groff do this. I know a lot of people are excited that he's going to be joined by Gracie Lawrence. I'm excited he's going to be joined by Emily Burgle because I think she is brilliant. I've seen her on screen before many times. I have never seen her on stage and there's still a lot of question marks around this. I think we're still really waiting to find out how meaty this is, what exactly this is going to look like. With a wonderful world just a few streets away doing the Louis Armstrong story, I'll be very intrigued to see whether this one can kind of pull ahead as the more consequential show. Very interested to see what happens here with Just In Time. For what it's worth, I do think they're also doing some cabaret style seating around the front of the stage. If you're really excited about this and want that kind of a semi immersive experience. Then beginning previews on March 28, but officially opening on April 22 at the Marquee Theatre Is Stranger the first shadow? Yes, Netflix is coming to Broadway and it's bringing all of the Demogorgons. Now, if you know nothing about Stranger Things, this is Netflix's acclaimed nostalgic science fiction horror series. I watched the entire thing in the run up to the opening of Stranger Things, the First Shadow here in London, which I think is actually something of a mistake. If you love the show and you watched it as it was progressing, then you're probably going to enjoy seeing this on stage if if you have never seen the show. I've heard from a lot of people in that position who still really enjoyed the stage production for what it's worth, because it does tell a self contained story. What you need to know about this is that it is actually a prequel to the events of the series. But it does spoil details that are only revealed in one of the most recent episodes of like the fourth series, whichever series. We just had one of the last few episodes where we got an awful lot of backstory. If you've seen it, you'll know what I'm talking about. That is what the stage production kind of riffs on, but it doesn't dispense major revelations, which is fine, except for the fact that that's what they were suggesting it would do as they were announcing it because they wanted people from around the world to feel like they had to fly to London to go and see it. And now they don't have to because they could also fly to New York. Worth adding as well that this is another one where the physical staging of it, the effects, the scale of the whole thing is also hugely impressive. They do a lot of really brilliant visual stuff on that stage. Stage. And the West End's Louis McCartney will be reprising his stage debut award winning performance. Now this brings us to the last few shows to open in the season. One of them is Real Women have Curves. This starts Preview performances on the 1st of April, officially opening on the 27th. And I'm looking at my phone because I can't remember which theatre this is going to. Surely I can figure it out from process of elimination if nothing else. We're really, we're really running out of theaters at this point. That one. That one. One. That one. That. No, I'm lost. The James Earl Jones. Of course, the James Earl Jones. This is based on the play by Josefina Lopez which inspires the iconic hit film. It's a funny, joyous and empowering new show coming to Broadway this April. And I have. What? Never seen the film. I have heard that it's very heartwarming that it's a lovely story. And looking through the rest of this season, it feels like we have a little bit of a gap in the market when it comes to lovely down to earth stories. Because everything's either about, you know, celebrities from years past or kind of inaccessible worlds. If it's not MI5 or dystopian science fiction, then it's something that happened a hugely long time ago or it's people in show business. We don't have a lot of like real people dealing with real stuff, at least not in the musical theater world. And in Real Women have Curves. It is the summer of 1987 and Ana Garcia dreams of flying away from East Los Angeles. But when her family's garment business receives a make or break order for 200 dresses, Anna finds herself juggling her own ambitions, her mother's expectations and a community of women all trying to make it work against the odds. This has the making of something really lovely, I think. The book is by Lisa Looma and Nell Benjamin with music by Joy Huerta and Benjamin Velez. I'm excited to see and hear more about this as we head towards its opening. This could be another surprising last minute contender for the Tony Award for best New Musical. You never know. Now beginning previews just after this, but opening just before that's April 4th and April 27th respectively is, and this is the branding confusion of the season, Pirates. Exclamation point. The Penzance musical. Perhaps better known to you historically as Pirates of Penzance. Don't worry, we're all confused. This is a Roundabout Theatre show coming to the Todd Haymes Theatre with a fascinating cast. Ramin Karimloo, Jinkx Monsoon and David Hyde Pierce will be leading the crew of Pirates the Penzance Musical. It's a hilarious new adaptation by Rupert Holmes of the Mystery of Edwin Drood, directed by Scott Ellis, choreographed by Warren Carlisle. These are all esteemed names and the synopsis here of this particular interpretation is that Gilbert and Sullivan's pirate ship docks in New Orleans in this jazzy bluesy vision of the crowd pleasing classic in an outrageously clever romp sizzling with Caribbean rhythms and French Quarter flair. Newly imagined young lovers, daring daughters, the tongue twisting Major General. I am the very model, you know the one, the rabble rousing pirate king, footloose pirates and fleet footed police. There is a shipload of musical comedy delights on board to dazzle first timers and Gilbert and Sullivan aficionados alike. God, I hope this is good. God, I hope this makes everyone happy like it plans to. But so rarely is that the outcome with these things when you try and please everyone. I am intrigued. It sounds like it's going to be campy. It sounds like it's going to be riotous and fun and joyous and I hope that it is. It is also the penultimate show on this list of new Broadway openings because sneaking in there due to another show's premature closure is dead. Outlaw. If rumors are to be believed. They were sniffing around for a Broadway theater for much of the end of 2024 and they have finally found one with the Longacre. Sadly Swept Away was and now Dead Outlaw is going to just make it into the current Tony Awards season having taken home Best Musical for its Off Broadway run at the Drama Desk Awards, the New York Drama Critics Circle Awards, the Outer Critics Circle Awards and the Off Broadway Alliance Awards. That's quite a set of award wins. This is definitely going to be another Best New Musical contender. Previously seen at the Manetta Lane Theatre, it's a darkly hilarious and wildly inventive musical about the bizarre true story of outlaw turned corpse turned celebrity. Keep up Elmer McCurdy. The show explores fame, failure and the meaning or utter meaninglessness of legacy. Dying is no reason to stop living life to its fullest. So many shows this season talking about fame in slightly unusual ways and also more than one musical about a corpse. What's the Doofenshmirtz lie like? If I had a nickel for every time I saw a Broadway musical about a corpse, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it's happened twice. Like, you know what I mean. The book is by Itamar Moses. The music and lyrics are both by David Yazbeck. Very exciting. And Eric de la Pena. That is the last new show of the season, which brings us to an end of everything coming to Broadway. That is an awful lot to choose from. If you are still feeling overwhelmed, you can look to the stars, but also I would encourage you to look to the creatives, look to the writers whose plays you have enjoyed previously. Look to the directors, look to the composers of those musicals. For many of them you can go and listen to recordings from previous productions as well. Now I mentioned I would also talk about some long runners it's worth going back to because of their new casting, including Hadestown, which has recently welcomed a new cast. I've heard that Hayley Kilgore is fantastic as Eurydice. There is also Moulin Rouge, which recently welcomed the hugely talented John Cardoza and Solea Pfeiffer. I would love to go back and see those two. I've kind of enacted a rule with myself because of a couple of negative experiences not to go back and see Moulin Rouge on Broadway again. But I may even break that rule to see those two because what great casting. Then there is Cabaret, Adam Lambert, currently sensational as the MC alongside Ali e Cravaglio, who I didn't get the chance to see. They have just announced the next two performers who are going to be taking on those roles, Eva Noblezada and Orville Peck. It won't surprise you to learn that I am more familiar with her work from the musical theatre canon. I think she's going to be a terrific Sally Bowles. And people are really excited about Orville Peck and the possibility that he might perform without his mask for the first time because he always wears a mask and nobody knows what his face looks like and presumably he's not going to wear that during Cabaret. I don't know whether they're going to leak that, you know, as a production image or whether you have to buy a ticket to the show to go and see it. It's also a great way to keep audiences happy if they complain that he missed any performances and they want a refund because, like, how do you know? And obviously I'm being facetious, but there's something very funny to me about celebrity casting whose face you inherently can't recognize. Jessica Vosk has recently joined the cast of Hell's Kitchen. If she is one of your favorite Elphabas, then you can go and listen to her giving what I'm sure is a thrilling vocal performance in the Shoshana Bean role. And Real Housewives of Beverly Hill star Erika Jayne has returned to Chicago. You may be getting deja vu. She has played Roxie Hart on Broadway before her run in the show was cut short due to the pandemic and then a lot of complicated legal stuff that happened thereof. If you've not watched Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, I do encourage you to. It's, it's, it's basically theater anyway. And yet another brilliant casting move. The show is spoofing her own celebrity as she plays Roxy, a housewife herself who is desperate for celebrity status. But for this to be Erica, who's had this very public encounter with the legal system I think is camp and ironic on an ingenious new level. Oh, my God. Hey, jumping back on here mid editing this video you're watching right now with Demigor. Congratulations on your Golden Globe to remember you that Ryan McCarten and Sarah Hyland are joining the Broadway cast of the Great Gatsby at the Broadway Theatre. Ryan this month and Sarah just a little bit after. But both exciting and sure to be very different performances in the roles of Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan. So go see that one as well. I also forgot about all in comedy about love because I literally have no idea. No, I don't either. I have no idea what it is. I don't think anyone does. I think it'll be remembered as one of history's mysteries or not. At all. But do let us know know if you've seen it, what it is anyway, that's all. And that, my theatre loving friends, is everything that I have to tell you about the Broadway season this spring. If there is anything that I happen to have missed, I hugely apologize. Feel free to let us all know in the comments section down below. If there's another show I didn't talk about that you would like to recommend, feel free to add it to the list. In the meantime, I hope that this has been helpful. Let me know if you are making Broadway plans and you have any other adjacent questions. If you want to know more about any of the shows I've already seen, you can go and check out those reviews. Reviews. You can head over to YouTube and go and watch my Broadway vlog so you can see what else we do when we're in the city where we eat, the other places that we visit, the other sort of theatrically adjacent entertainments that you can enjoy. Of course, there are also Off Broadway shows to be considered. There are concert presentations like the semi staged version of you're in Town Coming to New York City Center. I will be missing this, but you shouldn't. But I think I've recommended you more than enough shows for one day. I hope that you have enjoyed this and I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a stagey day. For 10 more seconds, I'm Mickey Jo Theatre. Oh my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a stagey day. Subscribe.