We’ve been through crazy-busy weeks here on the theater beat, but the coming one takes the cake. There were already several major openings scheduled the week of November 12, but things really skidded out of control after some shows postponed their debuts due to Sandy.
Five newsworthy shows are bowing on Nov. 15 alone: three new musicals (“Scandalous” on Broadway; MTC’s “Murder Ballad” and the Public’s newly rescheduled “Giant” off) and two plays (the New Group’s “The Good Mother” and Soho Rep’s newly rescheduled “We Are Pleased…”).
Any other time of the year, this could be an entire week’s worth of openings. And there’s more: a South African production of “Miss Julie” at St. Ann’s Warehouse; Christopher Durang’s latest, “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike,” at Lincoln Center; revivals of “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” on Broadway and “David Henry Hwang’s “Golden Child” at Signature; the return of last year’s critically acclaimed Duke Ellington revue “Cotton Club Parade” at City Center; the new Broadway play “The Performers” (you know, the one with Cheyenne Jackson in a gladiator skirt?).
And to top it all off, we have two cruelly short runs at BAM: Daniele Finzi Pasca’s Chekhov-themed new-circus extravaganza “Donka” and Ivo van Hove’s sprawling and reputedly awesome “Roman Tragedies.”
This is a good news/bad news moment in the season: It’s exciting to be able to see all these things in New York, but it’s also overwhelming to know we can’t see everything. Pick wisely, my friends.