HELLZAPOPPIN André De Shields, Amber Gray and fellow cast members in “Hadestown,” which will return to Broadway on Sept. 2, 2021, almost 18 months after the Covid-19 pandemic shut down New York City theater.
WHEN MY FRIEND SMP and I left the theater after “Girl From the North Country” on Wednesday night, March 11, 2020, we knew only that the World Health Organization had declared Covid-19 a global pandemic that day. Because of that, we’d avoided restaurants that night — and subways — and even hugging or air-kissing hello. After touching the stairway railing on the way back from the bathroom at intermission, I’d used Purell (SMP cleverly had some on hand) .
We learned the next day that Broadway was being shut down because of Covid. Immediately. We were told it would last two weeks.
Hahahahahaahahahahahaha.
Almost exactly a year and a half later, the lights of Broadway are finally coming back on. It’s official. Here’s a selection of the reopenings coming soon.
Sept. 2 // HADESTOWN This best-musical 2019 Tony winner about the challenges of romantic relationships – and a lot of other things – in hell (literal hell) begins the 2021-22 Broadway season. Opening night is on a Thursday, four days before Labor Day. Feel free to wear white.
Sept. 14 // HAMILTON Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical tribute to Alexander Hamilton, the American Revolution, New York City, immigrants (“They get the job done”), rivalry, diversity, nobility and undying love was 2015’s biggest hit. And guess what? It’s sold out again.
Sept. 14 // CHICAGO Kander and Ebb’s and Bob Fosse’s cheery-dark musical about murder, prison, flashy lawyers, tabloid journalism and dirty lies is coming back – but only with weekend performances for now. Give the show a break. It’s been running since 1996, when Bebe Neuwirth (that’s Bebe in the photo) and Ann Reinking starred, and it was already a revival (the original production was in the mid-’70s).
Oct. 3 // GIRL FROM THE NORTH COUNTRY Setting a Depression-era boardinghouse melodrama to Bob Dylan’s midcentury music and 21st-century candor? It works, gloriously. And it’s coming back, Wednesdays through Sundays, until the schedule expands around Thanksgiving.
Oct. 16 // AIN’T TOO PROUD. The Temptations musical reopens on a Saturday night, fittingly, and rolls right back into a full schedule.
Oct. 21 // JAGGED LITTLE PILL. It’s a full performance schedule for the return of Alanis Morissette’s music and related portraits of Americans in pain. In photo, from left: Celia Rose Gooding, Derek Klena, Elizabeth Stanley and Sean Allan Krill.
Oct. 22 // THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA. The longest-running of them all (it opened in 1988), “Phantom” returns with an almost-full schedule (no Tuesday performances or Wednesday matinees) for now. The chandelier has never missed a performance.
PS
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GUESS WHAT ELSE IS COMING BACK SOON?
“ASSASSINS” — THE OFF BROADWAY REVIVAL
If you missed the Press Nights story in May, here it is again. All about the streamed benefit special, whose talking heads included Hillary Rodham Clinton’s.
Frankly, we’re afraid to put in any more links right now. Go to “LATEST” right below the black-and-white Press Nights photo on the home page and click. You’ll find “John Wilkes, Lee Harvey, Squeaky” in Latest Stories.