I am planning a trip to NYC with my 17 yr old son. He has been a couple of times before so he has seen the normal sightseeing items. He loves plays and theater and has wanted to see Wicked forever. Of course, they are sold out. Can anyone recommend a reputable dealer to buy from? I don't mind paying a little extra for this one and we will try and get something else from the Tkts place. Also, could anyone recommend a play? Almost forgot, we will be arriving evening of March 20 and leaving March 24th. Have been researching other options too. Has anyone been to the Accomplicenewyork? It sounds like something he might enjoy. I have taken his older sister a couple of times and, of course, most of our time was spent shopping, which, he will not be interested in doing. Any good neighborhood type restaurants suggestions would be great too. We are going to be staying at the Lucerne but don't mind hopping on the subway to travel anywhere. Thanks for your help.

Do you think he would like the food tour? I've been - it was fun, the food was good, there were people of all ages on the tour, and it was great to have a local show us around!
www.foodsofny.com

Don't give up on Wicked just yet. Two weeks ago, on a Friday afternoon, we waltzed into the Times Square information center and picked up two excellent tickets for Wicked for the next night at about 1/3 the usual price.

http://www.timessquarenyc.org/about_us/info_center.html

Thanks for the info, I've never been to the Times Square info, do they sell many tickets?

Staying at the Lucerne will put you right at the foot of about 10 blocks of restaurants. Go one avenue in each direction, and you'll have another 10 blocks worth of choices. People in this neighborhood eat out A LOT!

Lots of good inexpensive/moderate and interesting places. It isn't a neighborhood that people would travel from afar to find really upscale restaurants, but there are some really solid choices these days.
What do you like to eat? There is lots of sushi and Asian (literally 3 on one block), barbeque, Cuban and Dominican, better than average diner food, real NY style deli, french bisto, seafood, Indian, Italian, Turkish, brunch type places, etc etc
Here are a couple of random suggestions:
Cafe con Leche: Cuban and Dominican, cheap(but not a really dive-y place), tasty, filling
Nice Matin (connected to the Lucerne): solid french food, Not cheap, but not unreasonable
Fairway Cafe and Steakhouse: Upstairs at a very popular neighborhood market. Casual cafe by day,reasonably priced steakhouse at night (I've only been for brunch/lunch)
Zeytin: Turkish, very accessible menu
Kefi: upscale but relatively inexpensive Greek food, right across the street from the Lucerne.
(disclaimer-- I haven't eaten there as there has always been too long a line when I go, and they don't take reservations. But maybe at a less popular hour... This place gets very good reviews)
Anything sound good to you?

janie, thanks for the suggestions. We like just about everything. We used to live in Houston and had lots of choices and now live in a small town in NC so look forward to city life and all the great places to eat. Of course, being from Houston we are big mexican food lovers but from researching it's hard to tell where to go for that. El Portal and Cancun both get good reviews. Has anyone been there? When my daughter and I were last there we ate at a Mama Mexican I think was the name. The food was okay but it was a fun place for her with the band walking thru and all. Thanks again for the help.

flit, if you are originally from Texas, I wouldn't try to find good mexican food in NYC! There aren't that many compared to other cities(though compared to where you live, maybe...) and they aren't really the best things in town. I actually can't think of any Mexican restaurants in the area (other than a couple of cheap burrito places) but maybe someone else has ideas.

I forgot about Senor Swanky's which isn't very far. I haven't been there in years , but I recall going more for the drinks than the food

By the way, most of the restaurants I mentioned have websites with menus, so you can take a look,
The nice thing about that neighborhood is that you can roll out of bed, or come back late from a day of sightseeing, and just walk a block or 2 and be able to find something open and that looks good.

janie, yes I know I won't expect too much from mexican but we love italian, asian, everything and with four nights we hope to get a little variety in. I will check the menus.

We have found that stubhub.com is fair for a ticket scalper - but you need to check what they have available.

Have a look at broadwaybox.com for other shows - so you can get advance discounts and don't need to spend vacation time standing on line.

Skip Senor Swanky's and Cancun if you're in the mood for good Mexican.

A little pricey, but another option is Rosa Mexicana. It's near Lincoln Center.

Janie gave you some good suggestions.

And if you can't get tickets to Wicked, your son might enjoy In the Heights. Haven't seen it, but it got great reviews when it ran off-bway.

Thanks lp_nyc, they do have tickets available for In the Heights. Could anyone suggest a good Easter Brunch?

Try the theatre box office. A couple of years ago when Spamalot was brand new, we wanted to go and they said it was sold out. So we went to the theatre box office and they had single seats. Now granted your not sitting together but ours were about a row apart. They were the best seats we have ever had at the theatre, front and center. We could actually see the expressions on the actors faces, one actor winked at my daughter. Have a great time with your son.

We just went to Is He Dead?, the recently rediscovered play by Mark Twain, and our two sons ages 15 and 13 really enjoyed it. It's very funny. August, Osage County has had fabulous reviews, but it's long.

In our neighborhood, Upper West Side, we have some very moderate restaurants: among them, Sun Chan at Broadway and 104th (Japanese) and the Mill at Broadway and 113th (Korean). He might like to see Columbia University, entering at 116th and Broadway.

sms, thanks for your suggestions. I am narrowing down our restaurants now. We did actually check out Columbia a couple of summers ago. He had Davidson College on his list which works with Columbia. He picked Carnegie Mellon instead so looks like I will get to visit Pittsburgh instead of NYC!

If he REALLY wants to see Wicked, I would not come here and count on getting the tickets, I would absolutely have them in hand when I got here.