Top Shows of 2025

Anyone who remembers the New York theatre scene from before the dreaded covid shutdown knows that this city has yet to fully recover. Theatre today is simply less ambitious, less imaginative, and less interesting than it was before 2020.

Still, there are some exceptions. Last year, there were a few remarkable shows that made my annual top-ten list, including Broadway's re-imagining of The Great Gatsby and a new production of the Giuseppi Verdi classic La Forza del Destino at the Metropolitan Opera.

This year, I have a new list of the best shows I saw in New York City that opened since January 1st. That doesn't include some of the excellent productions I saw outside of New York, including Sunday in the Park with George in Pittsburgh or Dear Liar in Niagara-on-the-Lake, not to mention my own workshop of After an Earlier Incident at Theatre of Western Springs.

10. Nongod - This trio of one-act plays by Leon Lone was a pleasant surprise. Seeing ancient deities from Egypt, Russia, and Mexico come to life on stage turned out to be both funny and emotionally engaging.

9. The Wild Duck - Ibsen classics other than A Doll House or Hedda Gabler are few and far between in the U.S., so I was delighted that Theatre for a New Audience announced they would reviving The Wild Duck. Maaike Laanstra-Corn gave a striking portrayal of Hedwig.

8. The Lady From the Sea - What was I saying about Ibsen classics? Even better was Susane Lee's adaptation of The Lady From the Sea, performed appropriately right on the Hudson River. Lee reset the play in Canada, but kept its spirit, and the outdoor venue was delightful.

7. Pygmalion - Gingold Theatrical Group always does a good job with their shows, and this year's production of Bernard Shaw's most famous comedy was no exception. Synnøve Karlsen, now famous as young Cassie from television's Miss Austen, made her New York debut as the irrepressible Eliza Doolittle.

6. Kowalski - Gregg Ostrin's play about an imagined meeting between Tennessee Williams and Marlon Brando was a hit Off-Broadway at The Duke on 42nd Street. There have been plans to move it to Broadway. If that happens, you'll want to see it. In addition to probing into the creation of the American classic A Streetcar Named Desire, it's a great vehicle for two fine actors.

5. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - While it's true that the second act wasn't as good as the first, this new opera based on the Michael Chabon novel of the same name still wowed audiences, in part due to sets and projections by 59 Studio. Fortunately, it's coming back this spring, so if you missed it in the fall, you can still catch it at the Met beginning February 17.

4. Wine in the Wilderness - Classic Stage Company had been planning this revival of the classic Alice Childress drama for quite some time. With direction by LaChanze, it hit all the right notes. The set designed by Arnulfo Maldonado wrapped the audience around the action, making the riot outside feel shockingly close, and Grantham Coleman once again gave an amazing performance.

3. The Last Bimbo of the Apocalypse - Michael Breslin and Patrick Foley's new musical perfectly channels pop music from earlier in the century while telling a story of the Internet stardom (and helldom) of today. The New Group deserves kudos for bringing it to Off-Broadway audiences, and for featuring some incredibly gifted young performers, including Patrick Nathan Falk, Keri René Fuller, Luke Islam, and Milly Shapiro.

2. Dead Outlaw - An even better new musical that premiered this year on Broadway (transferring from an Off-Broadway run last year) was Dead Outlaw, which tells the fascinating real-life story of Elmer McCurdy, who literally couldn't pull off a crime to save his life. Itamar Moses, David Yazbek, and Erik Della Penna were able to hilariously tell the tale while at the same time evoking scenes of sheer pathos. Like Yazbek's Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, this show deserves a long afterlife with regional and community theatres.

1. Moby-Dick - The best show I saw this year, though, has to be Jake Heggie's opera Moby-Dick, which made its Met premiere earlier this year. Though the piece first premiered at the Dallas Opera 15 years ago, this was the first time New York audiences were able to see and hear it live. Having written my own stage adaptation of the Herman Melville novel, I have lots of opinions on how to best stage the story, but the union of sets and projections seemed flawless in this staging, and the music is some of Heggie's best. The tenor Brandon Jovanovich also made a profound Captain Ahab.

That's the list. I know! Two operas and only a single work from the Broadway stage, and that one which premiered Off-Broadway first. The dynamics of New York theatre are certainly changing.

Dead Outlaw

When the Broadway musical Dead Outlaw posted its closing notice, I knew I'd have to rush to see the show before it was... dead.

Once I finally caught up with the piece, I discovered it was both funnier and sadder than I had imagined. Right from the beginning, the audience is laughing, but by the end they might want to cry, too.

This musical about the incompetent robber turned sideshow attraction Elmer McCurdy was the brainchild of David Yazbek, the songwriter also known for Dirty Rotten Scoundrels among other musicals. For Dead Outlaw, he teamed up with Erik Della Penna (who has some serious rock cred) and book writer Itamar Moses, who previously collaborated with Yazbek on The Band's Visit.

McCurdy is brought to life on stage by Andrew Durand, who previously appeared in Shucked. Durand makes us feel a surprising amount of sympathy for McCurdy, who bungled his burglaries just as he'd bungled pretty much everything else in his life. In the song "Killed a Man in Maine" he even brags about murder, though as the story's narrator (an energetic Jeb Brown) tells us, there's no evidence McCurdy ever killed anyone.

Brown's narrator (billed as "Bandleader" since he also leads the show's on-stage rock band) constantly reminds the audience that what they're watching is true. That's because if anybody made McCurdy's story up, no one would believe it. The tale involves not just the outlaw's sad life, but what happened to his body afterward. As the audience learns in the opening number, it ended up being discovered in a spooky dark ride in California when it was stumbled upon by crew members making an episode of The Six Million Dollar Man.

Oh, come on! Really? Isn't that a little too on the nose? Do you really expect us to believe that... wait, I forgot that all of this is real. McCurdy's fame as an outlaw was followed by a string of posthumous performances in carnivals, a wax museum, sideshows, movie theater lobbies, and finally an amusement park. As the audience watches this transfer from place to place, we are reminded of the rapacious spirit of American capitalism that seeks to exploit anyone and everyone, even after we're dead.

The other stand-out performance in Dead Outlaw comes from Julia Knitel, who plays an array of characters, from McCurdy's sweetheart to a young girl who grew up with the outlaw's corpse being stored in her house. Her touching performance of the song "A Stranger" is far more emotionally affecting than you would expect in a play this wild.

Ultimately, it's the show's heart rather than just its humor that is captivating to audiences. If you haven't seen it yet, hurry before it closes on June 29.

Playwrights are to be seen, not heard

Like many playwrights, I was dismayed when Jack Thorne, after winning the Tony Award for Best Play this year, was not allowed to give an acceptance speech.

Thorne scripted Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, but you wouldn't know it given the way the hit show's writer has been treated. Two producers were allowed to make speeches for the Tonys, but the awards ceremony decided to cut off the writer before he could say anything.

I was very pleased that the Dramatists Guild this week decided to write an open letter to the president of CBS--which broadcasts the awards--addressing the issue. Guild President Doug Wright (who famously wrote about the silencing of authors in his play Quills) did a remarkable job expressing the hurt and anger many dramatists feel.

This isn't just about Thorne being snubbed, either. Songwriter David Yazbek, who composed the scores for The Full Monty, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, received a Tony this year for The Band's Visit, but CBS didn't air his speech, because apparently they think American's don't care about songwriters. Wright made it clear just how ridiculous this notion is, saying:

Many of the songwriters of the year's hit musicals are already bold-faced names, beloved all across the country. Aerosmith, Cyndi Lauper, David Bowie, Lady Antebellum, John Legend, and cohost Sara Bareilles are just some of the composers responsible for SpongeBob SquarePants. The songwriters for Disney’s adaptation of Frozen, Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez, won an Oscar for the chart-topping anthem "Let It Go."

And yet the average American is supposed to know the names of supporting actors in Broadway shows? Really? I remember watching the Tonys while growing up in Florida. I was excited to hear about not just the dramatists, but also the directors, choreographers, and designers, since theirs was the work I might actually see. By the time I got up to New York to see a show or (more likely) a touring production came to town, no one in the original cast would be there. These were the artists who made a difference to me, not actors I would probably never get to see perform.

Wright also pointed out that other than Thorne, the writers of the nominated best plays were not even mentioned during the telecast! Maybe viewers might have wanted to know that Junk was written by the Pulitzer Prize winner Ayad Akhtar, that The Children is by Lucy Kirkwood, that Claire van Kampen wrote Farinelli and the King, and that Latin History for Morons is by some obscure guy named John Leguizamo. Oh wait, he's also an actor. Quick, put him on camera!

What is most baffling is that the Tonys are basically unique in their disrespect for authors. As Wright pointed out:

Every year, the Academy Awards faithfully includes screenwriters in not one but two categories. And it's not just the Oscars; the Grammys, Emmys, and Golden Globes all award the writers in their respective industries on the air. And yet it's the theater that most esteems writers; we are generally recognized as the principal artistic force behind new work, and we even retain ownership and control over the material we create. Yet on the very awards show intended to celebrate our craft, we are effectively negated.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure I can agree with Wright that the theater most esteems writers. The theater pays lip service to writers, but while actors, directors, designers, and stage managers can all make livings in the theater (not to mention the legions of stage hands), essentially all U.S.-based dramatists have to work outside of the theater to support their habit of writing plays. Some teach, some write for television and film, some (like Leguizamo) also act or direct. A couple of dramatists make money off musicals, but I can't think of a single playwright who is able to make a living just off of writing straight plays.

If we as a society really respect dramatists, perhaps we ought to start paying some of them a living wage. If we can't do that, the least we can do is not silence them at the Tonys.