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2024 Tony nominee Betsy Aidem, who's starring in The Ask at The Wild Project in the East Village. Photo by Kent Meister.
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Catch a recent Tony nominee in a compelling two-hander, a new musical based on a Fitzgerald novella, Belarus Free Theatre and more
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Adventurous audiences know that some of the biggest theatrical thrills are found on NYC's smallest stages. These shows are also great for theatregoers on a budget. In fact, TDF members can see dozens of Off-Off Broadway productions for as little as $11! Not a TDF member? Consider joining our Go Off-Off and Beyond program, which gives you access to discount tickets to indie theatre, music and dance performances for a one-time fee of five bucks.
If you're a TDF member, log in to your account daily to see what we're selling as ticket inventory changes frequently.
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Dixon Place, 161A Chrystie Street between Rivington and Delancey Streets on the Lower East Side
Runs September 6-21.
Dixon Place's HOT Festival, NYC's oldest queer culture fest (since 1992!), moves to September this year. Performance art, cabaret, readings, screenings and comedy are all on tap as dozens of LGBTQ+ artists take over the venue's stage and lounge. Highlights include seapony (Saturday, September 14), Kelindah bee Schuster's celebration of transmasculine pregnancy; downtown diva Susana Cook's raucous variety show (Saturday, September 14); and Glory W(hole) (Friday, September 20), an evening of queer BIPOC stand-up.
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The Wild Project, 195 East 3rd Street between Avenues A and B in the East Village
Begins September 6. Closes September 28.
Right now, it seems all anyone can talk about is politics. That's what makes the timing of The Ask, which is about listening across ideological lines, so perfect. Written by Matthew Freeman, the two-person, one-act play is a conversation between Greta (2024 Tony nominee Betsy Aidem), a sixty-something woman and former ACLU donor, and Tanner (Colleen Litchfield), a young nonbinary rep for the org who wants to know why she stopped giving. These two smart, passionate people have a lot in common, but because of the liberal-progressive divide, they struggle to connect. It's exciting and moving to watch them try.
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59E59 Theaters, 59 East 59th Street between Madison and Park Avenues in Midtown East
Previews begin September 11. Opens September 15. Closes September 28.
Jason Alan Carvell plays Mickey, a Black British father struggling to raise his rebellious teenage son and transcend his past in Tracks, set during the aftermath of the real-life, racially charged 2011 police killing of Mark Duggan in London. When Mickey's old friend Simone walks back into his life, tensions between father and son spin out of control. New Light Theater Project and Pendragon Theatre coproduce this world premiere.
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Chain Theatre, 312 West 36th between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in Midtown West
Begins September 12. Closes September 28. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $15 tickets.
Emerging Artists Theatre's annual fest features an eclectic array of works in progress, including plays, musicals and solo shows. Most projects get just one night, but Observant is receiving a nine-performance developmental run. Written by Pamela Weiler Grayson, it's a meditation on identity and faith as three generations of women explore their relationship to Jewishness and each other in the wake of a mass shooting at a synagogue.
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The Tank, 312 West 36th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in Midtown West
Begins September 12. Closes October 6. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $15 tickets.
A dark comedy of biblical proportions, Justin Halle's raucous play explores forgiveness, faith and the challenges of chosen family through a group of queer friends, including a drag queen who thinks the end is nigh and a drug-addled twink studying kabbalah.
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American Theatre of Actors, 314 West 54th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in Midtown West
Begins September 13. Closes September 29. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $15 tickets.
The Great Gatsby isn't the only F. Scott Fitzgerald classic that's been turned into a musical. His 1922 novella, The Diamond as Big as The Ritz, hits the stage this month with songs, but it's not a straightforward retelling. This adaptation uses a framing device of a young couple attempting to immigrate to the US and being perplexed by the tone of Fitzgerald's story about an insanely rich American family that goes to shocking lengths to keep their humongous diamond a secret. The tension between these two tales stirs up satire and show tunes.
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59E59 Theaters, 59 East 59th Street between Madison and Park Avenues in Midtown East
Previews begin September 15. Opens September 21. Closes October 5.
59E59 Theaters' AMPLIFY series celebrates the work of one playwright per season. This edition's pick is Chisa Hutchinson, with three of her plays receiving their NYC premieres between now and April. The second offering is Redeemed, a harrowing two-hander about Trevor, a young white man in prison for beating an Asian man to death, seeking forgiveness from the victim's sister Claire... or does he just want her support at his parole hearing? The fact that Trevor says Claire's brother's ghost is visiting him makes matters even hairier.
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Theater for the New City, 155 First Avenue between 9th and 10th Streets in the East Village
Begins September 19. Closes October 6. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $11 tickets.
For angry, isolated and irascible Anton, suicide isn't the end he had hoped for. Instead of oblivion, he lands in Purgatory where he promptly gets into arguments with his mother, grandfather and even his own id. Stefan Diethelm's dark comedy is a soul-searching trip through the afterlife.
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A.R.T./New York Theatres, 502 West 53rd Street between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in Midtown West
Previews begin September 20. Opens October 6.
Savannah Hankinson wrote and costars in this cheekily titled play about being openly LGBTQ in the rural South. When the hot lesbian in town starts coming into the local Home Depot for help, she disturbs the burgeoning friendship between two of the store's workers, who had bonded over the challenges of being queer in their small town. But perhaps there's an upside to this upset as they all start to shake up their unhappy lives.
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La MaMa's Ellen Stewart Theatre, 66 East 4th Street between the Bowery and Second Avenue in the East Village
Previews begin September 21. Opens September 24. Closes October 13. Closes June 30. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $23 tickets.
Being a self-declared "extremist lesbian" in a country often called Europe's last dictatorship is not easy. But that's a battle Belarusian basketball star-turned-protestor Katsiaryna "Katya" Snytsina embraces. Snytsina stars as herself in this kinetic show chronicling her incredible life as an athlete and activist, produced by the Olivier-nominated Belarus Free Theater.
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WP Theater at the McGinn/Cazale Theatre, 2162 Broadway at 76th Street on the Upper West Side
Previews begin September 21. Opens October 6. Closes October 20.
Following a successful audio play production, Mathilde Dratwa's Dirty Laundry has its stage premiere courtesy of WP Theater. After her mother dies unexpectedly, an adult daughter discovers her family wasn't as happy as she thought. What else could explain her father's longtime affair? Rebecca Martínez directs this heartfelt play about love, loss and facing uncomfortable truths. Sasha Diamond, Richard Masur and Constance Shulman star.
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The Brick, 579 Metropolitan Avenue near Lorimer Street in Williamsburg, Brooklyn
Begins September 25. Closes September 28.
The Brick's invaluable artistic director, Theresa Buchheister, may have just stepped down, but the Brooklyn theatre continues to present some of the city's most offbeat and intoxicating performances. Kyle Brosnihan's new absurdist play is a series of conversations between strangers and acquaintances outside a rural coffee spot. Their caffeine-fueled insights into the way we live now are hilarious and haunting.
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Axis Theatre Company, 1 Sheridan Square at Washington Place in the West Village
Begins September 25. Opens September 28. Closes October 26. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $21 tickets.
Axis Theatre Company brings back its celebrated, streamlined adaptation of Shakespeare's sparkling comedy about the romantic complications that ensue after fraternal twins are separated during a shipwreck. Artistic director Randall Sharp helms this production, featuring live music and a cast that includes indie theatre vets George Demas and Brian Parks.
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La MaMa's The Downstairs, 66 East 4th Street between the Bowery and Second Avenue in the East Village
Begins September 26. Closes October 6. If you're a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase $11 tickets.
La MaMa presents the New York premiere of famed Polish writer Witold Gombrowicz's play The Marriage in partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute New York and other orgs. Written in Argentina after World War II, it's an absurdist story set in a dream, in which a young man unexpectedly becomes a despotic prince and starts prepping for his royal wedding.
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The Tank, 312 West 36th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in Midtown West
Begins September 26. Closes October 13.
Written, costarring and codirected by Iranian-American theatre artist Deniz Khateri, Sunset, Eclipsed by Seagulls is the true story of an international romance undermined by unfair immigration laws. American Jake falls for Iranian Leyla in Paris. But just as she's about to join him in the US, Trump's travel ban starts. How do you maintain love when all hope seems lost?
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