All stories by Gordon Cox on BroadwayStars

Monday, August 9, 2021

'Merry Wives' Review: Shakespeare's Farce Updated to South Harlem in a Lively, Powerful Remix by Gordon Cox

For one of New York City's first major theater events in 16 months, eager audiences cannot do better than reveling in the natural splendors of Central Park's Delacorte Theater for the gleefu…

SOURCE: Variety at 09:00PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, August 4, 2021

Playing It Safe: Broadway Reopens With Rigorous COVID Protocols by Gordon Cox

In a Manhattan studio late last month, rehearsal was in progress. Two actors ran through a playful chase sequence. A fight choreographer, seated at the head of the room with the director, th…

SOURCE: Variety at 12:45PM[SHARE]

Theater Creatives Reveal What Industry Needs in Sundance Institute Survey (EXCLUSIVE) by Gordon Cox

As Broadway gets back to business and live performances resume around the country, the Sundance Institute has released a new study that diagnoses the state of the theater industry and imagin…

SOURCE: Variety at 12:00PM[SHARE]
Thursday, July 22, 2021

'Hamlet' Review: Ian McKellen's Greatness Shines Intermittently in a Rudderless Production by Gordon Cox

Skeptics puzzling over the logic of watching 82-year-old Ian McKellen playing student prince Hamlet need only look as far as the play's second scene in which Hamlet rebukes his mother. "I ha…

SOURCE: Variety at 12:18PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, July 20, 2021

How 'Pass Over' Is Making 'Precedent-Level Changes' on Broadway by Gordon Cox

When the Broadway production of Antoinette Nwandu's play "Pass Over" opens on Broadway, it'll incorporate significant changes " both on stage and behind the scenes. Listen to this week's …

SOURCE: Variety at 01:44PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, July 6, 2021

How 'What to Send Up When It Goes Down' Blurs the Line Between Ritual and Theater by Gordon Cox

Aleshea Harris' "What to Send Up When It Goes Down" isn't a traditional play, but audiences shouldn't come away with the mistaken impression that the show " a play, a ritual, a pageant and a…

SOURCE: Variety at 12:43PM[SHARE]
Friday, July 2, 2021

Shakespeare in the Park's Return Reflects How New York City and Its Theater Institutions Are Changing by Gordon Cox

As the New York Theater industry pulls itself out of the COVID era, every baby step feels like a milestone. But perhaps no other reopening will carry the same symbolic weight as the return o…

SOURCE: Variety at 12:45PM[SHARE]
Thursday, July 1, 2021

'Bach & Sons' Review: Miscasting Mars Nina Raine's Fascinating Play by Gordon Cox

"The whole point is to combine two complementary or contrasting thoughts in the same moment. Two feelings in the same moment." Johann Sebastian Bach, the 18th century's uncontested genius of…

SOURCE: Variety at 03:24PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, June 29, 2021

'Seven Deadly Sins' Review: Taking Orthodox Theater Outdoors Without Defiling the Soul by Gordon Cox

Who knew iniquity could feel so pulsating and immensely purifying? "Seven Deadly Sins," New York City theater's newest unholy outdoor experience, tests the limits of how far live theater can…

SOURCE: Variety at 11:00PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, June 23, 2021

'Under Milk Wood' Review: Michael Sheen Stars in a Tender but Fitful Reimagination of Dylan Thomas by Gordon Cox

"We are paying you to stay awake and care." That sounds like an admonition to the audience at the National Theatre's new production, "Under Milk Wood." But in fact it's sensible Susan Brown'…

SOURCE: Variety at 07:01PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, June 22, 2021

How the Revolution of 'Rent' Came to Cuba by Gordon Cox

The enduring musical "Rent," celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, didn't just revolutionize Broadway. It had an impact all over the world " and the new documentary "Revolution Rent" r…

SOURCE: Variety at 02:07PM[SHARE]
Thursday, June 10, 2021

'After Life' Review: London Stage Adaptation is a Fascinating Idea That Never Comes Alive as Drama by Gordon Cox

Remembrance of things past is not just a preoccupation of Proust. From King Lear's terrifying fear of losing his mind to Pinter's interlocked threesome in "Old Times" hotly contesting what e…

SOURCE: Variety at 09:51PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, June 8, 2021

'In the Heights': The Cuts, the Updates, the Ropa Vieja by Gordon Cox

For the creators of the Tony-winning Broadway musical "In the Heights," the new, big-budget movie version wasn't just a chance to go big with splashy song-and-dance numbers. It was also, acc…

SOURCE: Variety at 01:50PM[SHARE]
Saturday, May 29, 2021

'Walden' Review: An Ambitious West End Debut That Grapples With Big Ideas by Gordon Cox

Producer Sonia Friedman returns to the post-pandemic West End not with a safe revival but with a succession of brief runs for three socially-distanced world premieres by young writers, and i…

SOURCE: Variety at 07:00PM[SHARE]
Friday, May 28, 2021

Broadway's Hottest Marketing Tool: Streaming Shows by Gordon Cox

Should we go to a Broadway show tonight, or should we stream it? That's a question that people could be asking about more than just "Hamilton" when Broadway gets back up and running. If all …

SOURCE: Variety at 12:45PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, May 25, 2021

How a New Initiative Aims to Launch Broadway's Future Black Leaders by Gordon Cox

Broadway has long known that Black professionals are underrepresented backstage and in leadership positions in the commercial theater industry " but now a new initiative from a group of Broa…

SOURCE: Variety at 03:02PM[SHARE]
Friday, May 21, 2021

'Cruise' Review: West End Reopens Exultantly With Jack Holden's High-Energy, Impressive Solo Debut by Gordon Cox

As the U.K. begins reopening in the wake, fingers crossed, of the pandemic, the idea of the reopening the West End with a new solo show written and performed by a debuting playwright is some…

SOURCE: Variety at 04:27PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, May 11, 2021

How Heather Christian's 'Animal Wisdom' Transformed From a Theater Tour to a Boundary-Blurring Movie by Gordon Cox

The composer-performer Heather Christian describes her new movie "Animal Wisdom" as a "theater-concert-hybrid-séance-performance." And maybe after months of lockdown, that's what we all nee…

SOURCE: Variety at 05:27PM[SHARE]
Saturday, May 8, 2021

'Waiting for Godot' Review: Starry Tramps Like Us and Their Existentialist Dilemmas Make for Daring, Delightful Streaming Theater by Gordon Cox

For this smart, lockdown-era, streaming iteration of Samuel Beckett's show about nothing " and also everything, perhaps, and electric alienation for sure " director Scott Elliott and his tra…

SOURCE: Variety at 02:24PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Why Making Digital Theater Is Like Shooting 'Star Wars' by Gordon Cox

Think producing digital play readings is as simple as getting a few actors together on Zoom? Think again. Listen to this week's "Stagecraft" podcast below: For the starry Spotlight on …

SOURCE: Variety at 02:48PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, April 21, 2021

'Two Sisters and a Piano' Review: Jimmy Smits and Daphne Rubin-Vega Bring Passion and Poetry to Digital Theater by Gordon Cox

For Cuban American playwright Nilo Cruz, every line is poetry, and every couplet speaks to the socio-politics of his roots. That could mean the lyrical "Anna in the Tropics," the play that w…

SOURCE: Variety at 01:15PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, April 13, 2021

How Theater Community Mobilized to Stop Asian Hate by Gordon Cox

In response to the shooting in Atlanta and the rise in hate crimes it underscored, Asian American theater artists took action, organizing support and self-care programs for the Asian America…

SOURCE: Variety at 01:08PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Meet Jennifer Ashley Tepper, the Gonzo Journalist Preserving Broadway History by Gordon Cox

Theater historian or gonzo journalist? Jennifer Ashley Tepper, the author of "The Untold Stories of Broadway" series of books, thinks of herself as both. "Because I put my own discoveries an…

SOURCE: Variety at 04:08PM[SHARE]
Friday, March 19, 2021

As COVID-19 Restrictions Start to Ease, What Will It Take for Broadway Shows to Reopen? by Gordon Cox

Nobody " literally nobody " knows when or how Broadway will reopen. But now, a year into a shutdown that began March 12, 2020, the road map to recovery has begun to take shape. The pace and …

SOURCE: Variety at 11:00AM[SHARE]
Thursday, March 18, 2021

How NY PopsUp Aims to Get the Performing Arts Industry Back to Work by Gordon Cox

In recent weeks, New Yorkers might have stumbled upon a socially distanced pop-up performance by Jon Batiste at the Javits Center, or one by Patti Smith at the Brooklyn Museum. They were bot…

SOURCE: Variety at 02:52PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, March 16, 2021

How Blair Underwood Found New Colors in 'Paradise Blue' by Gordon Cox

In the Williamstown Theatre Festival's new audio version of "Paradise Blue," Blair Underwood gets the chance to revisit to a role he's been wanting to get back to since he first played it in…

SOURCE: Variety at 04:10PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, March 3, 2021

The Case for a New Federal Theater Project by Gordon Cox

The $15 billion Shuttered Venue Operators Grant " the federal program formerly known as Save Our Stages " isn't exactly a new Federal Theater Project. But according to Nataki Garrett, the ar…

SOURCE: Variety at 01:05PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, March 2, 2021

Jake Gyllenhaal Has Always Been a Theater Kid by Gordon Cox

Jake Gyllenhaal is nominated for three Tony Awards, one as an actor in the play "Sea Wall/A Life" and two as a producer (with his company Nine Stories) of "Sea Wall/A Life" and "Slave Play."…

SOURCE: Variety at 12:15PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, February 16, 2021

Mike Nichols Got His Juiciest Backstage Stories From Broadway by Gordon Cox

There are plenty of juicy backstages tales from both Hollywood and Broadway in "Mike Nichols: A Life," the new biography of director-producer-performer Mike Nichols. And the juiciest of them…

SOURCE: Variety at 03:32PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, February 2, 2021

How John Ridley Is Helping Bring Off Broadway to Screens by Gordon Cox

After winning an Academy Award for his screenplay of "12 Years a Slave" and creating the ABC series "American Crime," John Ridley has a lot going on " from an upcoming Blumhouse paranormal t…

SOURCE: Variety at 04:40PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, January 19, 2021

From Off Broadway to Marvel Superhero: Teyonah Parris on Her Journey to 'WandaVision' by Gordon Cox

Teyonah Parris waited seven years between theater gigs " but she wishes she hadn't. "That is too long!" the "WandaVision" actor declared on the latest episode of "Stagecraft," Variety's thea…

SOURCE: Variety at 03:51PM[SHARE]

All that Chat

2025-2026 BROADWAY SEASON
Jun 12, 2025: Call Me Izzy - Studio 54
Sep 16, 2025: Art - Music Box Theatre
Oct 08, 2025: Beetlejuice - Palace Theatre
Nov 13, 2025: Oedipus - Studio 54
Nov 16, 2025: Chess - Imperial Theatre
Mar 23, 2026: Giant - Music Box Theatre
Apr 06, 2026: Becky Shaw - Hayes Theater
Apr 16, 2026: Proof - Booth Theatre
Apr 26, 2026: Drama Desk Cut-Off