All stories by Richard Seff on BroadwayStars

Thursday, March 16, 2023

A DOLL’S HOUSE at the Hudson Theatre by Richard Seff

A planned visit to a Broadway show now requires a new sort of preparation. When I learned that a new production of Henrik Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House” was heading our way, I delighted i…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 04:06PM
Monday, February 27, 2023

BECOMES A WOMAN at the Mint at City Center on 55th Street by Richard Seff

Jonathan Bank has been Producing Artistic Director of Off Broadway’s Mint Theatre for many years, and he has made it his mission to search out and rediscover plays which were written in an…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 09:59PM
Friday, February 24, 2023

PICTURES FROM HOME at Studio 54 on W 54th Street by Richard Seff

Jeffrey Richards and his many associates here offer us a one-set, 95 minutes visit with an elderly couple and their middle aged son who is visiting them in their Southern California home. Ba…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 03:52PM
Friday, February 10, 2023

ENDGAME at the Irish Rep on W22nd Street by Richard Seff

New York’s jewel of an off Broadway theatre company called the Irish RepTheatre continues to offer new insights into memorable works like this gem from Samuel Beckett, which first provok…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 09:45AM
Monday, January 23, 2023

THE COLLABORATION at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre by Richard Seff

The Manhattan Theatre Club is offering its subscribers and the general public its production of this play first done at the Old Vic in London and now cast here in New York with the origina…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 05:15PM
Wednesday, December 21, 2022

KIMBERLY AKIMBO at the Booth Theater on 45th Street by Richard Seff

David Lindsay-Abaire wrote a similarly titled play some seasons back, and Jeanine Tesori joins him now as composer of the new musical on which it is based. This lively entry boasts an exce…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 06:19PM
Saturday, December 17, 2022

OHIO STATE MURDERS at the James Earl Jones Theater by Richard Seff

An assortment of gifted theatrical talents have combined to restore Adrienne Kennedy’s play “Ohio State Murders” to the current season on Broadway  Originally mounted in 1991 this rev…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 09:02PM
Thursday, December 15, 2022

SOME LIKE IT HOT at the Shubert Theater on 44th Street by Richard Seff

It took some twenty-odd producers plus the Shubert Organization, Neil Meron, MGM On Stage, and  Executive Producer S. Moynihan to bring this musical comedy to the stage on Broadway. With a…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 01:15PM
Sunday, November 20, 2022

& JULIET at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre by Richard Seff

A new musical has arrived at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre making its bid for acceptance by the press and the public with a list of ten new names adorning its Playbill title page as producer…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 04:15PM
Monday, November 7, 2022

Almost Famous at Bernard Jacobs Theatre by Richard Seff

The times are no longer a-changin’; they have already changed. What used to be called “Musical Theatre” is weathering the change as best it can, and the most recent example of the new …

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 09:29PM
Sunday, November 6, 2022

YOU WILL BE SICK at The Laura Pels Theatre by Richard Seff

Todd Haines, as Artistic Director of the Roundabout Theatre Company, has made the brave decision to mount this challenging new work by Noah Diaz as part of  the Roundabout Season in New Yor…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 12:24PM
Thursday, October 13, 2022

DEATH OF A SALESMAN at the Hudson Theatre by Richard Seff

Once upon a time… in the period affectionately known as The Golden Age, there was an opportunity for all to discover the mysteries and magic of something called “Broadway.” Some of us�…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 06:55PM

1776 at the American Airlines Theatre by Richard Seff

In Oscar Hammerstein’s book and lyrics for “The King and I,” there is a phrase used by the King whenever his own behavior seems to contradict itself causing him confusion. The phrase w…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 10:34AM
Monday, May 9, 2022

INTO THE WOODS at Encores! at City Center by Richard Seff

What a way to go! As  the final entry in the 2022 season of  Encores!, Artistic Director Lear Debessonet has taken the reins herself and led a company of miraculous performers to the best …

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 10:16AM
Friday, May 6, 2022

AMERICAN BUFFALO at the Circle in the Square Theater by Richard Seff

A smashingly vital revival of David Mamet’s “American Buffalo’” is heating up Broadway in a rare revival at the Circle In The Square Theatre. That space has an elliptical playing are…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 05:30PM

MR. SATURDAY NIGHT with Billy Crystal at the Nederlander Theater on W 41st Street by Richard Seff

BILLY  CRYSTAL was born in 1948 and spent most of his childhood in Long Beach, New York. His father, Jack Crystal, was a  prominent figure in the world of Jazz and ran a classic jazz recor…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 01:46PM
Wednesday, May 4, 2022

THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre at Lincoln Center by Richard Seff

Once upon a time one of the popular phrases was : “The times they are a changin.” Well, they’ve changed. A successful run on Broadway used to mean one of 300-400 performances. Prolific…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 12:13PM
Saturday, April 30, 2022

HOW I LEARNED TO DRIVE at the Manhattan Theatre Club by Richard Seff

Mary Louise Parker and David Morse along with their director Mark Brokaw have decided to have another go at Paula Vogel’s Pulitzer Prize winning one act play that deals with the rarely ex…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 09:43PM
Friday, April 29, 2022

FUNNY GIRL at the August Wilson Theatre by Richard Seff

For starters–If you happened to see it, it is wise to forget the original production of this Jule Styne-Bob Merrill-Isobel Lennart musical which enjoyed a run of over 1200 performances in …

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 03:04PM
Thursday, April 28, 2022

THE MINUTES at Studio 54 by Richard Seff

In his new Broadway play, Playwright/Actor Tracy Letts has invited us  in to witness the reading of the minutes at a November weekly meeting of the City Council of the town of Big Cherry. M…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 02:50PM
Friday, April 22, 2022

HANGMEN at the John Golden Theatre by Richard Seff

It seems to me a very odd time to be bringing back Martin McDonagh’s play,  written and first produced in the mid 1960s, yet here it is at the Golden Theater on Broadway, in a smashingly …

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 12:20PM
Sunday, April 17, 2022

THE LITTLE PRINCE at The Broadway Theatre by Richard Seff

If you think you have an inner child within you, one who has been yearning  to emerge, you might find something to engage, stimulate, enlighten, and entertain you in “The Little Prince,�…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 03:22PM
Friday, April 15, 2022

Birthday Candles by Richard Seff

Todd Haimes, the Artistic Director of the Roundabout Theatre Company, tells us in the Playbill for this production that the play first went into rehearsal on March 3, 2020.  Because of  th…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 10:29AM
Saturday, March 5, 2022

PRAYER FOR THE FRENCH REPUBLIC at the Manhattan Theatre Club Stage I, CITY CENTER by Richard Seff

Once you unravel and then connect the on and offstage characters, you will find much to admire in Joshua Harmon’s new play, a major new work from this gifted playwright. It is helped enorm…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 03:05PM
Friday, February 25, 2022

THE DAUGHTER IN LAW at the The Mint Theater Company in City Center, Stage II by Richard Seff

I’ve held back my review of this revival of a play by D.H.Lawrence for a day in order to research its history, because it was written in 1913 and put away by Lawrence without a produc…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 02:47PM
Friday, February 18, 2022

INTIMATE APPAREL in The Mitzi Newhouse Theatre at Lincoln Center by Richard Seff

Andre Bishop and the Lincoln Center Theater are presenting a new opera called “Intimate Apparel.” It’s an adaptation of Lynn Nottage’s play of the same name and carries an opera sco…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 06:11PM

THE MUSIC MAN at the Winter Garden Theatre by Richard Seff

Meredith Willson’s “Music Man” first blew into River City, Iowa, in 1957 with Robert Preston and Barbara Cook along for the ride, and now he’s back 45 years later with Hugh Jackman …

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 04:59PM
Sunday, February 6, 2022

The Tap Dance Kid at Encores! in City Center by Richard Seff

I could sense the air of anticipation as we waited for the matinee on February 6 to begin. Encores!, the much loved series that City Center in New York introduced in 1994, was about to re…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 04:46PM
Friday, February 4, 2022

MJ at the Neil Simon Theatre by Richard Seff

My professional life has been spent in live theatre, film, television–as a playwright, actor,  memoirist , librettist, reviewer, and grateful member of  the audience. My interest in musi…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 02:45PM
Saturday, December 11, 2021

Mrs. Doubtfire at the Sondheim Theater by Richard Seff

When it comes to musical theatre, I admit I am more ‘then” than “now.” It’s how I was trained, and I go back to a different time to the plays and musicals of the 1940s when there w…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 03:23PM
Monday, December 6, 2021

Cheek to Cheek: Irving Berlin in Hollywood by Richard Seff

The York Theatre Company, which is committed to giving life to new and revised musicals, has been doing so under the direction of designer James Morgan as Producing Artistic Director for the…

SOURCE: onandoffbroadwaytheaterreviews.com at 03:25PM

All that Chat

2023-2024 BROADWAY SEASON
May 30, 2023: Grey House - Lyceum Theatre
Jun 26, 2023: Just For Us - Hudson Theatre
Jul 24, 2023: The Cottage - Hayes Theater
Nov 16, 2023: Spamalot - St. James Theatre
Dec 18, 2023: Appropriate - Hayes Theater
Mar 07, 2024: Doubt - Todd Haimes Theatre
Apr 14, 2024: Lempicka - Longacre Theatre
Apr 17, 2024: The Wiz - Marquis Theatre
Apr 18, 2024: Suffs - Music Box Theatre
Apr 25, 2024: Mother Play - Hayes Theater
Jun 10, 2024: The Drama Desk Awards