No fewer than seven Broadway shows will close between now and the end of the year, including two new musicals, a hit musical revival, and four plays.
McNeal: Robert Downey Jr. is making his Broadway debut in Ayad Akhtar’s clunky, glitchy, and pontificating drama about a famous and egotistical writer who becomes unhealthily obsessed with artificial intelligence, which is receiving a tech-savvy production at Lincoln Center. One wonders whether the scenes are happening in real life or if they are meant to reflect an AI creation. Good luck making sense of it. Through Nov. 24 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center, lct.org.
Yellow Face: Daniel Dae Kim plays an exaggerated version of the prominent Asian-American playwright David Henry Hwang in Hwang’s loopy and loosely autobiographical meta-comedy, which was inspired by Hwang’s involvement in protests against the “yellow face” casting of Jonathan Pryce in the original Broadway production of “Miss Saigon” and the “Chinagate” hearings of the mid-1990s. Through Nov. 24 at the Todd Haimes Theatre, roundabouttheatre.org.
Once Upon a Mattress: With her big belting voice and comic ingenuity on full display, Sutton Foster is sublime as Princess Winnifred in this winning revival of the 1959 musical comedy fairy tale. The strong supporting cast includes Michael Urie, Nikki Renée Daniels, Daniel Breaker, Will Chase and Brooks Ashmanskas. Through Nov. 30 at the Hudson Theatre, onceuponamattressnyc.com.
Water for Elephants: Based on Sara Gruen’s 2006 novel (which was previously adapted into a 2011 film with Reese Witherspoon and Robert Pattinson), this nostalgic and well-meaning circus musical contains dazzling circus sequences, handsome choreography, and an original Americana-style score. But the storytelling is labored and hackneyed, which may be why it struggled at the box office. Through Dec. 8 at the Imperial Theatre, waterforelephantsthemusical.com.
The Notebook: The Broadway musical adaptation of Nicholas Sparks’ novel (which previously became a hit 2004 film with Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling) is an unapologetic tearjerker with an introspective and indie-style score by Ingrid Michaelson and an ambitious casting concept in which the young, middle-aged, and elderly versions of the protagonists Noah and Allie are played by actors of different races. Through Dec. 15 at the Schoenfeld Theatre, notebookmusical.com.
The Roommate: Patti LuPone and Mia Farrow lead an underwhelming two-hander/star vehicle that is essentially a contemporized, female version of “The Odd Couple,” in which two temperamentally opposite older women who become – you guessed it – roommates and experience culture shock, with Farrow as a shy and gentle divorcée from Iowa City and LuPone as a spunky lesbian artist from New York with a criminal past. Through Dec. 15 at the Booth Theatre, theroommatebway.com.
The Hills of California: Jez Butterworth’s absorbing three-act family drama/black comedy, which transferred to Broadway in a vivid production directed by Sam Mendes following a London run with much of its original English cast, observes a struggling English family in 1955, where the mother trains her daughters to become a singing group modeled on the Andrews Sisters, and again in 1976, when the daughters have reunited as their mother takes her final breaths. Through Dec. 22 at the Broadhurst Theatre, thehillsofcalifornia.com.
