NYC - Best Broadway Play? Post Lincoln Center Dessert?
 

Greetings Fodorites. I have been blessed with wonderful answers so far, so I'm going to cross my fingers and give it a go:

My husband and inlaws and I will be in NYC 10/27 - 10/31 are anxious to catch a Broadway play. I'd love to see "A Chorus Line" but after sitting through both "Evita" and "Movin' Out" (all music), I promised my husband we'd see a play. I've been looking at some broadway sites, and Losing Louie looks good. Anyone seen it or can recommend something else? The content must be suitable to watch with your inlaws, please keep that in mind. We are late twenties, they are mid-sixties.

Also, we're going to Lincoln Center on Saturday 10/28 to hear Beethoven's Fifth, and we'd love to go somewhere nearby afterwards for some coffee and good dessert - a sit down restaurant, not a bakery. Any suggestions? Thank you for your time.

Dessert & Coffee after performance at Lincoln Center -- I asked this very question about 3 years ago & used a recommendation from this board. I'll pass it along with hopes that it is still as fantastic as it was then.

Cafe Mozart

http://www.cafemozart.com/

http://www.menupages.com/restaurantd...mp;cuisineid=0

It's what we term a "short walk" from Lincoln Center.

Enjoy Beethoven & desert.

Thanks for the recommendation. Cafe Mozart looks like a great option.

Forget Losing Louie. It got panned by the critics. However, even if it got good reviews, would you take your inlaws to a show where there are jokes about masturbation and oral sex and there's a 10-minute discussion of the relative merits of circucision?
There's not much to choose from in the area of non-musicals. Your limited choice on Broadway:
1. A revival of Butley, starring Nathan Lane.
2. A revival of Shaw's Heartbreak House, starring Philip Bosco and Swoosie Kurtz
Off-Broadway, there's a revival of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, starring Cynthia Hixon; and a revival of Tennessee Williams' Suddenly Last Summer, starring Blythe Danner

Thanks for the advice on Losing Louie. I did not realize it contained such "risque" topics. And, no, to all of the above about viewing w/ the inlaws. I'll check out your recommendations. Thanks.

I am in the same boat...I want to see either a musical or maybe go to the symphony, but I think a musical would be a bit more NYC themed.

I have only seen 2 that interest me, Les Miserables and A Chorus Line.

Still looking....

What about the Little Dog Laughed? It will be in previews as of Oct. 26. I heard it was great off Broadway. Discounts on broadwaybox.com here
http://broadwaybox.com/shows/the_lit...c_tickets.aspx

If I were headed to New York about now, high on my list would be the new production of Butley starring Nathan Lane and the wonderful Dana Ivey. Oddly it is being billed as a "drama", but I find it a very bittersweet and often funny dark comedy -- although it gets more and more "dramatic" towards the end. A professor's life turns upside down as his wife and his male lover/former student leave him on the same day.

I'd probably buy a ticket to Butley, also, or else the Heartbreak HOuse (I love Shaw and Swoozie Kurz, so how bad could it be). There are a couple interesting things coming up from Nov and into 2007, but not at the very end of October.

I think Broadway doesn't have tons of great musicals and has been in a rut for years on that score, putting on endless things that aren't theater but just stringing pop songs together and some vestige of an overlay flimsy "plot" (ie, MOvin Out, etc., they even had some thing of John Denver's songs that didn't last long). But people like those who don't really want a real theater piece, so I guess that's why they keep copying that concept. I would have liked to see Jersey Boys, however, because that is least a bio or something that can more properly be called theater.

With the current musicals, I'd pick Hairspray if you haven't seen it, then maybe Chorus Line. There is always the Color Purple, also, which I've never been that keen on seeing on Broadway, but I wouldn't want to see Les Miz again so soon. That hasn't really been gone that long from Broadway. Oh, how about Chicago, is that still on? I do think that is a great musical in terms of songs, and a lot are not. I really liked Chorus LIne years ago, but the review of the revivial was not thrilling and maybe it would just seem warmed over. If you've never seen it live, though, I'd think that would be a good idea.

I convinced my husband to see "A Chorus Line", and my in-laws agreed. I know the reviews were so-so, but I grew up on the movie, so I've already ordered the soundtrack and I'm preparing for a "Singluar sensation!" Thanks to everyone for their recommendations.

I was thinking that Evita and Movin' Out were not really representative of what a classic "musical" is. While this production of A Chorus Line may not be the best, it's more of a classic Broadway show (imo). Hope you all enjoy.

Just read the New Yorker review of Chorus Line last nite and it was quite glowing. Enjoy!

Don't get me wrong. I think A Chorus Line is a classic, one of the best ever. But, it's just as much "all music" as Evita and Movin' Out are. So, I wonder how unsatisfied your husband will be!

well, that's true -- it is mainly music in comparison to some older musicals where they had some acting and drama in-between the songs. I remember the first time I went to an opera, for some reason I was expecting it to be like a musical (don't know why, I should have known better), and was surprised that the whole thing was just singing (or recitatives, which I can't stand). For some reason, I expected there would be some kind of play and acting in-between the breaking into song moments. I was thinking more of the old musicals (South Pacific, Music Man, etc.). That's why they call Les Miz sort of opera-like rather than a typical musical, also. Actually, the choice between Les Miz and Chorus Line was a choice between two mostly music ones.

Chorus Line got a fairly bad review in the Washington Post, that's the one I read.

with no doubt go see Wicked or Jersey Boys! I am dying to go back to see them again. Wicked is a story about the Good and bad witches of the east and West before dorothy came around. Jersey boys is about the Four Seasons and Frankie Valli.

Would A Chorus Line be a quintensential example of NY broadway?