Jesse Green: Last News

Brent Lang Executive Editor of Film and Media“Kimberly Akimbo,” one of the hottest tickets of the theatrical season will transfer to Broadway this fall following an acclaimed run at the Atlantic Theatre Company. The musical about a New Jersey girl who has an aging disease that makes her appear to be decades older than her teenage years will begin previews on October 12 and officially open on November 10.

Mary Louise Parker and Billy Crudup’s tumultuous split made headlines when the Almost Famous actor left the Weeds alum for Claire Danes.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic The verdicts on the new Broadway musical-comedy “Shucked” are in, and the critics have asked you to lend them your ears — so to speak — as they’ve cobbled together their reactions to the possible sleeper hit. (Sorry, but once you’ve seen the production, it may take you six months or longer to stop speaking in puns.) Variety’s critic wrote that “with its exuberance, heart and non-stop yucks, ‘Shucked’ is the surprise delight of the Broadway season.” The New York Post’s notice trumpeted it as “Broadways’s best and funniest new musical.” Time Out said the show leaves theatergoers “gorged to satisfaction on a big, tasty bag of Broadway puff.” Entertainment Weekly wrote that “its refreshing embrace of diversity and unapologetically corny sincerity can definitely put a smile on your face.” Even one of the minority that was harder on it, the New York Times’ Jesse Green, begrudgingly admitted of the parade of laughs: “forced into submission,,” he wrote, “you eventually give in.”

Gordon Cox Theater Editor The composer (“Once Upon a Mattress”), young adult author (“Freaky Friday”) and philanthropist Mary Rodgers wanted to write a memoir that was candid, cutting, dishy and vanity-free — the exact opposite of the books penned by her father, the legendary Broadway composer Richard Rodgers, and her mother Dorothy Rodgers. “Mary didn’t want it to be fake like her parents’ memoirs had been,” said Jesse Green, the co-author of Mary Rodgers’ recently released memoir “Shy.” Speaking on the new episode of Stagecraft, Variety‘s theater podcast, Green explained, “She wanted it to spark with the actual sound of people enjoying thinking about their lives.”

Ben Brantley, the influential New York Times theater critic, will leave the job next month. “This pandemic pause in the great, energizing party that is the theater seemed to me like a good moment to slip out the door,” Brantley said in a statement.News of Brantley’s departure was announced on Twitter by the newspaper’s theater reporter, Michael Paulson.Brantley joined the Times as its second-string theater critic in 1993, taking the chief critic job three years later. His last day on the job will be Oct.

Greg Evans Associate Editor/Broadway CriticBen Brantley, the influential New York Times theater critic, will leave the job next month. “This pandemic pause in the great, energizing party that is the theater seemed to me like a good moment to slip out the door,” Brantley said in a statement.News of Brantley’s departure was announced on Twitter by the newspaper’s theater reporter, Michael Paulson.Brantley joined the Times as its second-string theater critic in 1993, taking the chief critic job three years later. His last day on the job will be Oct.