Sara Krulwich/The New York Times Maria Dizzia and Greg Keller in the New York Theater Workshop production of “Belleville.â€Charles Isherwood, theater critic for The New York Times, answers readers’ questions about the spring theater season.
Q.
Of the plays by emerging playwrights making their Broadway debuts, what are some of the most exciting and noteworthy â€" KM, New York
A.
Which Broadway season are you looking at I’m afraid I don’t see any notable new playwrights emerging on Broadway in the next couple of months. Unless you count Colm Toibin! Although he’s an acclaimed novelist this gifted Irish writer I suppose does qualify as a Broadway newbie, with “The Testament of Mary.†Broadway is not, and has not been for some time, the place to look for exciting and noteworthy emerging playwrights. That would be Off Broadway, and the regional theaters. I feel like I’m flogging a dead horse at this point, but I would urge you to check out Amy Herzog’s “Belleville†at New York Theater Workshop and Annie Baker’s “The Flick†at Playwrights Horizons if you’re looking for noteworthy new plays to see in the next couple of months.
Q.
With so many new musicals opening in the next few months, do you think any one will drown out the others â€" pl123, New York
A.
Although there is no “Book of Mormonâ€-size juggernaut on the horizon, the most likely candidate for attention-hogging is probably “Matilda,†the stage adaptation of a Roald Dahl book. The reason: it’s surfing in on a wave of acclaim from London. In fact, the season has been unusually quiet in terms of London imports - “Matilda†is really the first and only across-the-pond production, which is highly unusual.
I think the playing field this spring is fairly even in terms of musicals getting a fair shake: “Hands on a Hardbody†and “Kinky Boots†have both won some nice reviews out of town, but neither is a sure thing with a built-in audience, and even “Matilda†is not likely to be a known commodity outside theater aficionados.
Q.
Why so many plays â€" Mike Rafael, Montclair, N.J.
A.
This one’s pretty simple: plays are cheaper to produce. (Although nothing is cheap to produce on Broadway.) They are also simpler, for the most part, to stage. Musicals have many more working parts, which means many more collaborators to wrangle … which means more money to spend.
Q.
I received an email today about “The Testament of Mary†with Fiona Shaw. Do you have! any back! ground info on this one â€" Andrea, Peekskill, N.Y.
A.
It began life as a play - or rather a monologue - by the Irish writer Colm Toibin. (I’m a particular fan of his novel “The Master,†about Henry James.) The great Irish actress Marie Mullen, who won a Tony for “The Beauty Queen of Leenane†some time ago, performed it at the Dublin Theater Festival a few years ago. Mr. Toibin subsequently turned it into a novel, but now it is returning in its original form, with the formidable team of Ms. Shaw and her longtime collaborator, Deborah Warner, directing. This is the one highbrow entry in a spring season that’s trending, ahem, in other directions. (Nothing new there.) It will be the one you need to see if you want to impress friendsat cocktail parties of the well-heeled and the culturally well-informed.
Q.
What’s the outlook for the emergence of new producers from the under-age-35 demographic Will Broadway suffer a producer shortage in the next five to 10 years â€" Arvid, Valparaiso, Ind.
A.
To take the questions in reverse: I see no evidence that Broadway will suffer a producer shortage in the next decade. Season after season we’ve seen the 40 or so Broadway theaters remain pretty consistently booked.
What we could definitely use more of: producers who are able to look beyond the most obvious ways of connecting with audiences these days, which is to say slapping stars into road-tested vehicles, or concocting musicals from other cultural spare parts. (Read: movies.) Otherwise the fossilization of Broadway into a vapid commercial m! arketplac! e catering to everyone’s baser instincts (namely celebrity-ogling) will only continue.
As for the first question: It’s probably important to distinguish between investors and producers. The line is blurred today, since anyone who puts any significant sum into a show now has above-the-title billing once reserved for actual producers. (Open a Playbill today and you’re likely to find more names above the title than there are actors in the cast.) True producers - who develop shows from start to finish, in close collaboration with artists - remain, as far as I can tell, pretty thin on the ground. And since as a critic I have minimal engagement with them, I couldn’t tell you the average age of this rare specimen, but I suspect it’s somewhere north of 35. Jordan Roth, who now runs the Jujamcyn Theaters, is considered a babe in the industry, at the ripe age of 37.
Playing the cockeyed optimist, I would hope that producers under 35 might have more innovative ideas about how to develop new audieces and fresh ideas about what might work on Broadway, and the success of unlikely shows like “Once†offers promise that adventurous think can pay off - at least occasionally.
Q.
How do you decide where to travel to see theater that you somehow suspect might interest readers â€" Freddie, New York
A.
Mostly by the caliber of the talent involved. A new play by an established writer, or one the editors and I think is worthy of note, is always of interest. Major new musicals are relatively rare, so if time permits I like to check out as many of those as possible, although we tend not to review shows that have already announced Broadway openings.
