Reviewing the Drama: Broadway, Off-Broadway, Ballet, Movies, and TV Reviews

Casting News NYCB principal dancer Sara Mearns will appear as a guest artist in the Matthew Bourne ballet adaptation of The Red Shoes , which will play at New York's City Center this fall. Mearns will alternate performances with Ashley Shaw , who originated the role of Victoria Page, the tortured dancer, in the London premiere. The Red Shoes runs October 26 through November 5. The New York Times has more , and the City Center website has the cast schedule. Lin-Manuel Miranda ( Hamilton ) has joined the cast of the upcoming reboot of the beloved animated series, Duck Tales . Miranda joins a cast that already includes Ben Schwartz and Danny Pudi . Theater Mania has more. It's an Honor Drama League Awards —Winners of the Drama League Awards were announced, with Ben Platt  making history as the youngest winner of the Distinguished Performance Award. Elsewhere, Oslo  took home the Outstanding Play honor, and Platt's show, Dear Evan Hansen , won Outstanding Music...

It's an Honor Lilly Awards — Tony nominee Denee Benton ( Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 ) and others are among this year's Lilly Award honorees. These awards recognize women's contribution to American theatre, and the women will be feted at the May 22 ceremony. Playbill has more. Mark Twain Prize for Humor —Funny man and former late night weirdo David Letterman has been named the 2017 recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. Letterman will be honored at the Kennedy Center in October, and an edited recording of the tribute will likely air on PBS later in the year. Rolling Stone  has more. Broadway.Com Awards —Winners of the Broadway.com Audience Choice Awards were announced, and the fans loved Dear Evan Hansen . The musical won eight awards, including Favorite New Musical and Favorite Lead Actor, Ben Platt. Visit Broadway.com for the full list of winners. Off-Broadway Alliance Awards —Honoring excellence in off-Broadway, the Off-Broadw...

Mark Rylance Sets Broadway Return The three-time Tony Award winner and Academy Award winner will return to Broadway this winter. Rylance ( Twelfth Night , Bridge of Spies ) leads the cast of Farinelli and the King , a new play by Clair van Kampen that premiered at Shakespeare's Globe in 2015. As noted in the announcement on Playbill , Farinelli and the King is "inspired by the true story of the Italian castrato opera singer," and includes many Handel arias. Previews at Broadway's Belasco Theatre (where Rylance was last in the dual Twelfth Night/Richard III productions) begin December 5, with opening night set for December 17. The limited engagement is scheduled to conclude March 25, 2018. Casting News This is not a drill: Aaron Tveit will play Bobby in Company this summer! The stage and screen vet ( Next to Normal , Graceland ) will take on the lead role of Stephen Sondheim's musical at the Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield, MA, August 10-Sept...

The New York City Ballet Here/Now Festival continues, and on Saturday, May 6, I got to see program five, which includes the newest from Alexei Ratmansky, Odessa . Herein, some notes about all five ballets that are part of the program. Jeu de Cartes —For a ballet that's supposed to be light, the choreography is heavy, it feels—in many sections—grounded. This Peter Martins ballet, which is set to Igor Stravinsky's eponymous composition, is meant to be an abstract representation of a card game. Megan Fairchild is the Queen of Hearts, and she's joined along the way by Harrison Ball , Joseph Gordon , and Aaron Sanz as the Kings of Spades, Diamonds, and Clubs (respectively). The estimable ensemble are also dressed as the various suits. For all that frivolity, it's just an uninteresting ballet. It's not bad or off-putting, but it's also not engaging, despite, on Saturday, a talented cast. Gordon was fine if a little one-dimensional; Sanz was appropriately ...

Helping to kick off New York City Ballet's Here and Now Festival, which celebrates modern choreographers' works, was an all-Wheeldon program. During the evening, fans got to watch four ballets by the Tony-winning choreographer , who was the company's first resident choreographer. The evening began with Mercurial Manoeuvres , which, notably, is the last ballet Wheeldon choreographed for the company while still one of its principal dancers. A ballet for 21 dancers (set to Shostakovich's "Piano Concerto No. 1 in C Minor, Opus 35"), this has a decidedly militaristic feel in the ensemble moments. (Watch, for example, the dancers' arms—they move with precision like the hands on a clock. It's exact and clipped.) That's beautifully juxtaposed with the grace and softness of the utterly impressive pas de deux (danced on Saturday by Tiler Peck and Tyler Angle ). Both types of dancing—ensemble and pas—are mercurial. The ensemble keeps changing forma...

History was made at New York City Ballet on Thursday (April 2 7 ) night as the venerable dance company presented its first–ever all–Peck program, an evening dedicated to ballet's golden boy, Justin Peck , a soloist with the company and its resident choreographer. It was a momentous occasion for the toast of the town, who, still under 30, is seen as a ballet wunderkind and, perhaps, the superhero who is going to bring ballet back to popular culture. Peck has been choreographing for NYCB (and others) for just five years, yet he's already created 13 ballets for the company (with a 14th set to premiere in May), including one that was the subject of the documentary Ballet 422 , his ode to his hometown, Paz de la Jolla . Peter Martins had his pick of Peck's many creations, but for the first all–Peck program, he chose four works: In Creases , the first ballet Peck made for NYCB; The Dreamers , a pas de deux; New Blood , one of Peck's collaborations with fashion designer...