One thing I did when I was in New York recently, whenever I come back to New York was register for the $10 Alexander Hamilton lottery tickets that you can do online on their app. I have to get my Hamilton fix when I’m there. It’s absolutely one of my favorite Broadway shows of all time. So they put out these tickets for each performance. How can you beat that?
However I wanted to see some plays. I haven’t seen a play in forever. So I knew I wanted to see the revival of The Iceman Cometh with Denzel Washington playing Hickey, one of the main characters. The Iceman Cometh received 8 Tony award nominations including two noms for Denzel and one of my favorite actors David Morse. How can you miss one of our current great actors doing a Eugene O’Neill play? Granted if you’re not familiar with Eugene O’Neill, it is VERY heavy drama with humor sprinkled throughout. Actually most of O’Neill plays are dark and centered around deep relationships and weighty themes. Definitely a lot of drama. I performed in a play of O’Neill’s, Ah Wilderness! (no, not on Broadway, haha), which ironically is O’Neill’s only comedy…sort of. But I had seen The Iceman Cometh on Broadway many years ago. Actually it was 1999 with Kevin Spacey playing the role of Hickey. Now I am NOT a theatre critic so this is just my take. I remembered Kevin’s performance to be engaging as well as the whole cast back then. However when I saw the it recently with Denzel and the current talented cast of veteran actors from theater, film & TV, I felt I was transported to 1912 in NYC and hit me more this time. I thoroughly enjoyed each actor’s performance. It’s a long play, three hours and fifty minutes with two 10 minute intermissions. So if you’d rather see a shorter, lighter Broadway show, this definitely ain’t for you.
Then on another night I saw the revival of Angels in America: Part One: Millennium, first of a two-part play by American playwright Tony Kushner. Angels in America garnered 11 Tony Award nominations including noms for actors Nathan Lane, Andrew Garfield, Susan Brown and Denise Gough. The play is a complex, often metaphorical, and at times symbolic examination of AIDS and homosexuality in America in the 1980s. I only saw Part One which was three hours and thirty minutes with two 15 minute intermissions. They perform Part One on one night and then Part Two the next night. So you’re essentially going consecutive nights. Unless you’re gung ho and can handle four hour plus plays back to back with a dinner break. The actors and crew need to eat too! So these marathons are on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I didn’t have enough time so I just saw the Part. One. The play also features a star studded cast of veteran actors including a Broadway favorite Nathan Lane and film star Andrew Garfield (The Amazing Spider-Man, Hacksaw Ridge among others). Actually I went to the same high school as Nathan, real name Joe Lane, at St. Peter’s Preparatory School in Jersey City. Of course, he was there before me! Besides the outstanding cast, I have to say Andrew was totally AMAZING! No pun intended. You just have to see it I guess.
I really LOVED this play! All the characters were portrayed with grace under fire. The constant themes of love and betrayal ran throughout ever so clearly. The connections the characters had with each other, you just could understand and relate.
I hope people get to see these plays and others before they close! I know it’s tough when you don’t live in or near New York. But if you do, these are such important plays in American history to experience live.
UPDATE: Congrats to all the 2018 Tony Award winners! Now I’m glad I went to see Angels in America even though it was only Part One. Hopefully I can get back to New York to see Part Two. I’m really happy that Nathan Lane won, very deservedly and Andrew Garfield definitely was spectacular so no surprise there although I thought Denzel might win as well as David Morse.
But I didn’t see any other shows so what do I know! See you later on Broadway!
