Fa-la-la-la, it’s that time of year, it’s beginning to look a lot like…well, you know. Yes, the holidays are upon us, ladies and gentlemen, and, as always, off- and off-off-Broadway are getting into the spirit of the season. Here are a few holiday-themed shows you might want to put on your wish list — and not a Rockette in sight!
Little Lord’s Babes in Toyland: Oh, those babes are never going to be the same again after the Little Lord Theater Company gets a hold of Victor Herbert’s 1903 operetta and stages it as a “recession spectacular.” A tribute to both the joys of Herbert’s holiday original and to the occasionally misguided sincerity of little theater groups, the show is adapted and directed by Michael Levinton for The Brick Theater; for more info, visit www.bricktheater.com.
A Molly Jolly Christmas: We first discovered poet/elementary school guard Molly “Equality” Dykeman in last summer’s FringeNYC festival. Now Molly comes back to town in her first Christmas variety show, but will she be able to muck her way through musical numbers, choreography and a glittering array of guest stars through the Percocet-fogged haze that is her mind? Laurie Beechman Theater, December 6-22. Call 212-352-3101.
Naked Holidays: It wouldn’t be Christmas off-Broadway without some serious full monty-ing under the mistletoe, now would it? And so EndTimes Productions is delighted to offer up its 5th annual edition of the darkly comic — and scantily clad — Yuletide bacchanalia, a gleeful evening of naughty short plays that puts a theatrical spin on some of our best-loved winter traditions. Roy Arias Stage 4 at the Times Square Arts Center, December 8-30. www.EndTimesProductions.org
Jackie Beat: The Nutcracker: And now for an antidote to all that Christmas cheer! Drag diva Jackie Beatinspirational than any Hallmark card. You can’t Beat her, so join her! Call 212-352-3101. continues her mission to poison every sacred belief and tradition in her 14th annual holiday show, which rocks the rafters at Laurie Beechman from December 14-18. Whether you celebrate Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa or Ramadan, you’ll find an evening spent with Jackie “roasting chestnuts” to be far more
DOWN ON THE FARM
If you’ve seen LCT’s
production of War Horse, then you’ll want to giddy-yap across town to 59E59 Theaters to
catch New Perspectives Theatre Company and its U.S. premiere production of Michael
Morpurgo’s Farm Boy, which
begins performances December 7 as part of the long-running Brits Off
Broadway festival. Farm Boy
is Mr. Morpurgo’s sequel to War Horse,
his immensely popular novel that was turned into last year’s Tony-winning Best
Play (and soon to be a major motion picture by Steven Spielberg),
and the new piece is a magical tale of the bonds between grandfather and
grandson told through drama, storytelling and original music. John Walters and Richard Pryal star, and Daniel Buckroyd is the adapter and director. Performances begin
December 7; for more info, log on to www.britsoffbroadway.com.
PROVOCATEURS
The renowned off- and off-off-Broadway director Lee Breuer will embark on his first collaboration with a living American playwright when he directs the provocatively titled drama Sex In A Coma, written by Susan Eve Haar. The play, which premieres at HERE Arts Center’s Dorothy B. Williams Theatre on December 1, was inspired by a horrific newspaper headline, “Girl Raped in Coma,” and Ms. Haar has set out to explore what it means to live in a body, and take on the questions of what is the self and what is the soul. The play is also a love story, a Romeo and Juliet of alternative consciousness. The cast includes Paul Kandel, David-Julian Melendez, Maude Mitchell, Ching Valdes-Aran, Jessica Weinstein and Wendy vandan Heuvel. Performances continue through December 11. www.sexinacoma.com.
OH, YOU GOTTA HAVE FRIENDS
Or so sang Bette Midler back in the hedonistic 1970s when she was known as The Divine Miss M. And the hedonistic late 70s (on the way to becoming the rude-awakening 80s) just happen to be a backdrop for Marc Castle’s new play Friends and Relations, which begins performances at the June Havoc Theatre in the Abingdon Complex on December 1. F & R celebrates the lives of 7 gay men across the two decades as they search for love (and other things) in a world gone just a bit mad. Success, failure, breakups and breakdowns: it’s all in the game as the calendar pages flip by. Adam Fitzgerald is the director, and the show is being presented by No Anita No Productions under the auspices of Fractured Atlas. Opening night is set for December 4.
