Elevator Repair Service continues servicing the classics… Follies finds the Broadway spotlight once again… and Newsies “seizes the day” at Paper Mill.
Open the gates!
Blake
Saturday, September 10 
LAST CHANCE? The “summer of love” Broadway stop on the national tour of Hair comes to an end. This Tony Award-winning revival of the quintessential 1960s rock musical about peace, love and sex during the time of the Vietnam War includes the hit songs “Let the Sunshine In,” “Aquarius,” “Good Morning Starshine” and the title song. After Broadway, the tour continues with stops in Dallas, Denver, San Diego and San Francisco. (St. James Theatre, 246 W. 44th St., btwn. Broadway & 8th Ave., Click here for Playbill Club discount tickets)
Sunday, September 11 
OPENING? The Elevator Repair Service has made a name for itself with theatrical word-for-word stagings of great American classics like “The Great Gatsby” and “The Sound and the Fury.” The troupe returns with The Select — their theatricalized adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises.” (New York Theatre Workshop, 79 E 4th St, btwn. 2nd Ave. and Bowery, info/tickets)
GO? Tony winner Richard Nelson continues exploring the state of the nation with the second in a series of plays about the Apple Family. We first met the Apples in Nelson’s That Hopey Changey Thing. In this newest play, Sweet and Sad, we check back in on the liberal Apples, back together again on the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The production reunites the cast of Hopey Changey, including Tony Award winners Shuler Hensley and Maryann Plunkett, as well as Jon DeVries, Laila Robins, Jay O. Sanders and J. Smith-Cameron. (Through Sept. 25, Public Theater, 435 Lafayette St., info/tickets)
Monday, September 12 
OPENING? The starry Broadway revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Follies reunites the famous composer-lyricist with frequent collaborator and brilliant interpreter of his work, Bernadette Peters. This show is all about reunions, as it follows former members of the famous “Weismann” (read Ziegfeld) Follies as they reunite to see their former theatre (and, in some cases, their former selves) face demolition. Also starring Jan Maxwell, Elaine Paige, Mary Beth Peil, Jayne Houdyshell, Rosalind Elias, Florence Lacey, Terri White, Danny Burstein and Ron Raimes. (Marquis Theatre, 1535 Broadway, btwn. 46th & 47th Sts., Click here for Playbill Club discount tickets)
Tuesday, September 13 
OPENING? Elaine Stritch returns to the Café Carlyle stage with her acclaimed ode to Stephen Sondheim: At Home at the Carlyle: Elaine Stritch Singin’ Sondheim...Again. Why Not? (Yep—that’s the title!) Stritch is an incomparable performer. Don’t miss her takes on songs like “Rose’s Turn” from Gypsy, “Send In The Clowns” and “Every Day a Little Death” from A Little Night Music, and “The Road You Didn’t Take” from Follies. Sublime! And it wouldn’t be an Elaine Stritch show without a ton of laughs and interesting stories about her time in some of Sondheim’s finest shows. (Through October 8, Café Carlyle, 35 E. 76th St., info/tickets) 
GO? Kristin Chenoweth makes an in-store appearance promoting her new solo CD “Some Lessons Learned,” which the Tony winner has said “is more along the lines of what I grew up singing, like the music I sang in church in Oklahoma.” The CD boasts songs by Diane Warren, Desmond Child and Dolly Parton. (Barnes & Noble, 555 5th Ave., at 46th St., info)
Wednesday, September 14 
GO? PR guru-turned-movie-maker-turned-playwright Dan Klores debuts The Wood, a new play about the larger-than-life New York Post and Daily News columnist Mike McAlary. Klores’ play chronicles McAlary’s life in-between the time he was diagnosed with cancer (which would eventually kill him at the age of 41) and pursuing the story that would win him a Pulitzer Prize — the 1997 Abner Louima case. (Through Oct. 9, Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre, 224 Waverly Place, off of 7th Ave., info/tickets)
Thursday, September 15 
GO? The London hit comedy One Man, Two Guvnors (rumored to be making a Broadway transfer this season) will play as part of the “National Theatre Live” broadcast series, which screens the theatre’s acclaimed shows in cinemas around the world. The series continues throughout the fall and New Year with screenings of The Kitchen and Dominic Cooke’s version of Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors. (Click here for tickets and a list of venues near you)
Friday, September 16
GO? The Paper Mill Playhouse will debut the new musical Newsies based on the 1992 Disney film featuring songs by Alan Menken and Jack Feldman. This expanded stage version features a new book by Harvey Fierstein and stars Jeremy Jordan (soon to be seen in Broadway’s Bonnie & Clyde). Newsies is based on the true story of a newsboys’ labor strike in 1890s New York. Includes the songs “Seize the Day” and “Santa Fe.” (Through Oct. 16, Paper Mill Playhouse, 22 Brookside Drive, Millburn, NJ, info/tickets)
