THE WEEK AHEAD, Jan. 5-11: Broadway Bids Adieu to War Horse, Grace, Chaplin, Elf and Dead Accounts

By Blake Ross
January 5, 2013

Playbill.com's weekly planner reminds you that Broadway bids adieu to War Horse, Grace, Chaplin, Elf and Dead Accounts… Quiara Alegría Hudes finally brings the Pulitzer to New York… Laurie Metcalf returns to The Other Place… and Priscilla spreads the disco around the country! The first full WEEK AHEAD of 2013 is here!

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Saturday, January 5
GO→ Renowned cabaret singer Marilyn Maye starts off 2013 with a by-request engagement at Manhattan's Metropolitan Room. Billy Stritch will accompany the legendary octogenarian as she puts together yet another song-filled show built from audience suggestions. (Through Jan. 9, Metropolitan Room, 34 W. 22nd St., btwn. 5th & 6th Aves., info/tickets.)

Sunday, January 6
LAST CHANCE→ The 2011 Tony Award winner for Best Play, War Horse, will gallop off into the sunset when it closes on Broadway. The play, featuring the resplendent Tony Award-winning equine puppets of the Handspring Puppet Company, tells the touching story of a young boy parted from his beloved horse during World War I. The show continues on tour throughout the U.S. and abroad. (Vivian Beaumont Theatre, 150 W. 65th St., btwn. Amsterdam and Broadway, info/tickets.)

LAST CHANCE→ Katie Holmes and Norbert Leo Butz star in Theresa Rebeck's latest dark comedy Dead Accounts. The Jack O'Brien-directed staging features Butz as a slick Manhattan banker who returns home to his modest home in Cincinnati with a secret. There to greet him are his dowdy sister (Holmes), his doting mother (Jayne Houdyshell), a wallflower best friend (Josh Hamilton) and a snooty Manhattanite ex-wife (Judy Greer). (Music Box Theatre, 239 W. 45th St., btwn. Broadway & 8th Ave., click here for Playbill Club discount tickets.)

LAST CHANCE→ Paul Rudd, Michael Shannon, Ed Asner and Kate Arrington star in Craig Wright's new play Grace. When a pious young couple (Rudd and Arrington) move to Florida with the hope of opening a chain of gospel-themed hotels, an irritable neighbor (Shannon) and a nosy exterminator (Asner) get in their way — to tragic consequences. (Cort Theatre, 138 W. 48th St., btwn. 6th & 7th Aves., click here for Playbill Club discount tickets.)

	Rob McClure as Chaplin
	photo by Joan Marcus

LAST CHANCE→ The life of screen legend Charlie Chaplin is explored in the new Warren Carlyle-helmed musical Chaplin. Through Thomas Meehan's book and Christopher Curtis' score, we see how Chaplin went from a poverty-stricken child living in the slums of London to one of Hollywood's most famous actors of all time. The show features a critically acclaimed breakout performance by Rob McClure in the title role. (Barrymore Theatre, 243 W. 47th St., btwn. Broadway & 8th Ave., click here for Playbill Club discount tickets.)

LAST CHANCE→ The seasonal favorite Elf closes on Broadway. The peppy musical based on the 2003 film of the same name centers on the North Pole's Buddy, a man-child human sent raised among Santa's elves, who treks into the real world to find his birth father. Directed and choreographed by Casey Nicholaw, it features a score by Wedding Singer scribes Matthew Sklar and Chad Beguelin and a book by Thomas Meehan and Bob Martin. Donning the red and white garb of jolly ol' St. Nick is "Seinfeld" star Wayne Knight. (Al Hirschfeld Theatre, 302 W. 45th St., btwn. 8th & 9th Aves., click here for Playbill Club discount tickets.)

Monday, January 7
GO→ The day after Dead Accounts closes on Broadway, its star, Norbert Leo Butz will join Dirty Rotten Scoundrels songwriter David Yazbek and his band, His Lady Parts, for the first in a series of concerts called First Mondays. The pair famously worked together on Scoundrels, the musical that helped Butz nab the first of his two Tonys. The monthly series promises original music by the Tony-nominated composer-lyricist sung by some of Broadway's best. (92YTribeca, 200 Hudson St., off Canal St., info/tickets.)

GO→ Lynn Nottage's Intimate Apparel will get a starry, one-night-only reading to benefit the global women's advocacy group Donor Direct Action. The reading of one of Nottage's first hits about an African American seamstress at the turn of 20th century Manhattan will feature Ari Graynor, Quincy Tyler Bernstine, Joshua Henry, Tonya Pinkins, Condola Rashad and Morgan Spector. (Romulus Linney Courtyard Theatre at The Pershing Square Signature Center, 480 W. 42nd St. btwn. 9th & 10th Aves., $40-$75, info/tickets.)

	Laurie Metcalf in The Other Place.
	photo by Joan Marcus

Tuesday, January 8
OPENING→ When Quiara Alegría Hudes' Water By the Spoonful took home the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, theatre watchers were stunned because the new play had only been seen by a handful of people in a low-profile production at Hartford Stage in 2011. New York audiences and the theatre world at large will finally get to see the acclaimed play, about an Iraqi war vet's return home, in a larger scale production at Second Stage. (Second Stage Theatre, 305 W. 43rd St., at 8th Ave., click here for Playbill Club discount tickets.)

GO (TOUR)→ Get on the bus! The disco-pop musical Priscilla Queen of the Desert kicks off a national tour in Minneapolis! The sparkly play about three drag queens and their jaunt through the Australian desert features disco classics like "It's Raining Men," "I Will Survive" and "Say a Little Prayer." The 17-city tour follows its premiere engagement with stops in Cleveland and St. Louis this month. (Orpheum Theatre through Jan. 13, click here for a full schedule of tour dates/tickets.)

Wednesday, January 9
GO→ The Public Theater presents its annual Under the Radar Festival Jan. 9-20 at the theatre's newly-renovated Lafayette Street home. Expect new works from playwrights and theatre troupes from around the globe. Highlights include a new work from the renowned theatre company Elevator Repair Service (Gatz); A 20th Century Abridged Concert of Popular Music by downtown theatre artist Taylor Mac; and a new take on Hamlet presented by Iran's Leev Theater Group. (Through Jan. 20, Public Theater, 425 Lafayette St., info/tickets.)

Thursday, January 10
OPENING→ Laurie Metcalf returns to her critically acclaimed, Obie-winning performance in Sharr White's The Other Place, now on Broadway in a Manhattan Theatre Club production. The Joe Mantello-directed play centers on Juliana Smithton (Metcalf), a tough-as-nails doctor who has dedicated her career to developing a dementia-fighting drug only to find herself in the middle of a health crisis. With her declining health comes an implosion of her personal life, including a divorce from her longtime husband (Daniel Stern) and an estrangement from her daughter (played by Metcalf's real-life daughter, Zoe Perry). (Friedman Theatre, 261 W. 47th St., btwn. Broadway & 8th Ave., click here for Playbill Club discount tickets.)

Friday, January 11
PREVIEWS→ America Ferrera stars in the world-premiere of Laura Mark's Bethany, produced by Off-Broadway's Women's Project Theater. The "Ugly Betty" star will take a decidedly darker turn as a desperate, financially strapped denizen of a town virtually wiped out by the housing market collapse. Officially opens Jan. 20. (New York City Center Stage II, 131 W. 55th St., btwn. 6th & 7th Aves., info/tickets.)

Blake Ross is the editor of Playbill magazine. Follow her on Twitter @PlaybillBlake.

Watch highlights of Chaplin: