Must see shows on Broadway?
 

My friends will be there in June. Any recommendations? I know they plan to see Jersey Boys. I told them to go by the Tickets booth to check out there offerings for a matinee. Any other tips for theater in NYC?

I thought "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" was a riot. Good songs, plenty of humor. But, it's probably not a show that someone who is of the generation to remember the first recording of Frankie Valli will appreciate. (My parent's, for example.)

I thought Wicked was a good show, as well.

Hello Fodorites who go to shows on Broadway. Any other ideas on this topic???

Hairspray........

Wicked was great ... I read the book before going. The stage story is not as dark as the book, but still a great story. It was great to know the characters as well as I did... Glinda and Elphaba were great fun!

Sorry about all the "great's" in my post ... it's late and I just did my taxes... Wicked was still an INCREDIBLE evening.

"I know they plan to see Jersey Boys."

I take it then that they have their tickets? The first week of February there were no seats available for mid May to mid June (except a handful of back corner restricted view or priority seating at a couple hundred dollars each.

Thanks Neo, I will pass this on to them. NO, they probably do not have their tickets.

What else should they buy tickets for? Doesn't anyone go to the theater anymore? Anyone see Drowsy Chaperone?

Heavens, I don't think you're getting a lot of responses, because NO ONE can tell you what will appeal to them. There are dozens of choices now. If their goal is to say "we saw the MUST SEE hit" then yes, Jersey Boys is probably the hottest ticket. If they want good theatre in the form a musical, it doesn't get much better than Grey Gardens. If they want cutting age and new musical, then probably Spring Awakening. If they want just plain fun, Drowsy Chaperone, Curtains, Hairspray, Spamalot, Chicago, Legally Blonde, and a number of others are good. The Color Purple I found to be a surprisingly good show.

Drowsy Chaperone is a really fun show -- mostly a sort of spoof for people who know and love big musicals. Nothing to make you think, and not really for those who don't find splashy shows fun.

And that's only the musicals. For non musicals there's Inherit the Wind, A Year of Magical Thinking, Moon for the Misbegotten, Journey's End and a host of others too.

They really should go to Playbill.com and look through the listings and the descriptions to see what THEY might like.

IMHO I thought Spring Awakening was crap.

The singing was good - I'll give you that however I was distracted by the amount of spit spewing from one of the leads onstage.

The storyline I saw coming from a 100 miles away.

And what was with the Bohemian chick in the 20's? OR the little dabble in abuse that just went away.

I thought it was ok. It's billing as ground breaking however is overrated.

Spring Awakening - "the new Rent"

Drowsy Chaperone - <i>mindless</i> fun

Thanks all. I feel so out of touch.

Neo, your post was a big help. The Tonys always catches me up too.

Just for the record, I didn't particularly like Spring Awakening either. The entire story and point of it seemed to be &quot;sex among teenagers was more naive and less talked about 100 years ago than today&quot;. Well? DUH! But it was fun to watch and I was glad I saw it. (Fortunately I couldn't see the spit from the front row of the mezzanine.)

And also, I believe Gekko has recommended Drowsy Chaperone a number of times, so I hope I'm not speaking out of turn to say don't misinterpret his -- &quot;mindless fun&quot; -- as being an insult to Drowsy Chaperone. If we eliminated all the great musicals which were mindless fun, there wouldn't be a whole lot of them left. Sometimes mindless fun is good.