Last year I saw 93 shows/readings/cabarets. This year I saw 99— 6 more than last year! I am happy that the number has gone up from last year (last year was the first year the number had gone down!) but I’m also disappointed I didn’t crack 100, which is where the number used to be in years past. I can only conclude that friends not having cabarets anymore has really taken its toll (I only went to 2 song nights, 1 reading, and 1 presentation this year), although I thought actually paying for a bunch of tickets this year would bring the number up.
Some Enchanted Evening: The Music of Rodgers and Hammerstein (Carnegie Hall)
I’m not going to go into statistics as I do with the movies (there are just too many!), but I saw most of these shows for free and paid a discount rate for the others (I actually only paid for 16 of them–5 more than last year–but 3 were with family). I worked 2 openings and attended 1 implosion party. I saw 1 show 3 times and 4 shows 2 times. I sang in 3 of these performances and my work was featured in 2 of them.
In the past, I’ve done a star rating system, but since I know people involved in many of these shows, I’ve done away with that and just highlighted my favorites. After the favorites is the HUGE list of everything I saw. Then, I have listed some fun panels, exhibits, and events I also attended this year.
Top 10 Favorites (in no order, I swear):
Gob Squad’s Kitchen (Public Theater)
Rx (Primary Stages)
In This House (Two River Theater Company)
Uncle Vanya (Sydney Theatre Company-Lincoln Center Festival)
Melancholy Play (13P)
13P Implosion Party and show (13P)
Einstein on the Beach (BAM)
Some Enchanted Evening: The Music of Rodgers and Hammerstein Concert (Carnegie Hall)
Sherie Renee Scott (54 Below)
The Whale (Playwrights Horizons)
Runners Up (Also in no order):
Giant (Public Theater)
Annie
Orpheus (New York City Opera)
Marvin Hamlisch Memorial Concert (Juilliard)
Into the Woods (The Public)
Merrily We Roll Along (Encores)
The Morini Strad (Primary Stages)
Falling (Minetta Lane Theatre)
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
A Civil War Christmas (New York Theatre Workshop)
Close Up Space (Manhattan Theatre Club)
Look Back in Anger (Roundabout)
Wit (Manhattan Theatre Club)
Daniel Kitson: It’s Always Right Now Until It’s Later (St. Ann’s Warehouse)
Gob Squad’s Kitchen (Public Theater- first time)
Gob Squad’s Kitchen (Public Theater- second time)
Rx (Primary Stages- first time)
Rx (Primary Stages- second time)
Merrily We Roll Along (Encores)
How I Learned To Drive (Second Stage Theatre)
Hurt Village (Signature Theatre)
Rites of Passage (Prospect Theater)
Myths and Hymns (Prospect Theater)
Carrie (MCC)
Assistance (Playwrights Horizons)
Venus in Fur
Rx (Primary Stages- 3rd time)
Blood Knot (Signature Theatre Company)
An Iliad (New York Theatre Workshop)
No Place to Go (Public Theater/Joe’s Pub)
In This House (Two River Theater)
The Morini Strad (Primary Stages- first time)
Drive (ASCAP presentation)
Leap of Faith
The Lyons
Don’t Dress for Dinner (Roundabout)
4000 Miles (Lincoln Center Theater)
Fat Camp (off-Broadway)
The Morini Strad (Primary Stages- 2nd time)
The Little One and the Sea of Letters (Trusty Sidekick)
Peter and the Starcatcher
My Children! My Africa (Signature Theatre)
Jesus Christ Superstar
Nice Work If You Can Get It
The Book of Mormon
Orpheus (New York City Opera)
The Common Pursuit (Roundabout)
Cock (Off-Broadway)
Harvey (Roundabout- first time)
Rapture, Blister, Burn (Playwrights Horizons)
Harvey (Roundabout- second time)
The Composer Speaks: Grass Roots American Melancholy by Josh Schmidt (Essential Voices USA)
Bridging Two Worlds: A Yiddish Musical Journey with the The Jewish People’s Philharmonic Chorus (Symphony Space)
February House (Public Theater)
Food and Fadwa (New York Theatre Workshop)
Reading of Red Speedo by Lucas Hnath (New Dramatists)
The Heart of the Matter (MCC Benefit)
Clybourne Park
The Columnist (Manhattan Theatre Club)
Leaving Ikea (The Artful Conspirators)
Opera in Eden (American Lyric Theater- Symphony Space)
Dogfight (Second Stage Theatre)
As You Like It (Public Theater- Shakespeare in the Park)
Warrior Class (Second Stage Theatre)
Fresh Produce’d July (Imported Talent)
Uncle Vanya (Sydney Theatre Company-Lincoln Center Festival)
Into the Woods (Public Theater- Shakespeare in the Park- 1st time)
Melancholy Play (13P)
Triassic Parq (Soho Playhouse)
Prodigy (NYU Summer Workshop)
Heartless (Signature Theatre)
Fresh Produce’d August (Imported Talent)
Into the Woods (Public Theater- Shakespeare in the Park- 2nd time)
Missing Parents (NYU Summer Workshop)
Anna Jacobs Concert (Ars Nova)
If There Is I Haven’t Found It Yet (Roundabout)
The Best Man
Detroit (Playwrights Horizons)
Red Dog Howls (New York Theatre Workshop)
Hot Mess in Manhattan (off-Broadway)
Chaplin
13P Implosion Party (Joe’s Pub- 13P)
Marvin Hamlisch Memorial Concert (Juilliard)
Einstein on the Beach (BAM)
Obamarama! Concert (Duplex)
Cyrano de Bergerac (Roundabout)
An Enemy of the People (Manhattan Theatre Club)
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Some Enchanted Evening: The Music of Rodgers and Hammerstein Concert (Carnegie Hall)
The Mystery of Edwin Drood (Roundabout)
Hamlet (The Wooster Group)
Sherie Renee Scott (54 Below)
Falling (Minetta Lane Theatre)
Bad Jews (Roundabout)
Annie
The Performers
Murder Ballad (Manhattan Theatre Club)
Sam Salmond Cabaret (Laurie Beechman Theatre)
VCR Love (Dixon Place)
Giant (Public Theater)
The Whale (Playwrights Horizons)
Inner Voices (Premieres- 30th Street Theatre)
A Civil War Christmas (New York Theatre Workshop)
Bare (New World Stages)
A Wind in the Willows Christmas (Two River Theater)
Working (Prospect Theater)
Fresh Produce’d December (Imported Talent)
Water by the Spoonful (Second Stage Theater)
The Great God Pan (Playwrights Horizons)
Miscellaneous Panels, Exhibits, and Events:
De Kooning exhibit (MoMA)
Carsten Holler: Experience exhibit (New Museum)
Maurizio Cattelan exhibit (Guggenheim)
Jim Henson’s Fantastic World exhibit (Museum of the Moving Image)
Jamal Joseph talk and book signing (KGB Bar)
Whitney Biennial
Paley Center (5/3/12)
Tom Sachs Space Program MARS exhibit (Park Avenue Armory)
Paley Center (6/8/23)
Paley Center (6/20/12)
She’s Making News: Paula Zahn (Paley Center)
Creatures of Light exhibit and Planetarium show “Journey to the Stars” (Natural History Museum)
Barnes Museum (Philadelphia)
The Clock (Lincoln Center Atrium)
Sheldon Harnick Program (Paley Center)
Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
New Yorker Festival: The Future of Sitcoms (New Yorker Festival)
New Yorker Festival: Lena Dunham (New Yorker Festival)
Comic Con (Sunday)
Tatzu Nishi: Discovering Columbus (Columbus Circle)
The Clock (MoMA)