Thinking Theater NYC

New Love Written by Adam Szymkowicz Directed by Christy Hall Presented by brooklynONE productions  at bkONE: The Tom Kane Theatre 51 35th St. Brooklyn, NYC March 5-15, 2026 Brianna Espinal and  Isaiah Rothstein One of the peculiar truths of theater is that intimacy is built not through grand declarations but through repetition. Lines are rehearsed, gestures repeated, rhythms discovered together until something like learned instinct begins to emerge. In Christy Hall’s deftly directed production of Adam Szymkowicz’s New Love , that hard-won instinctive connection becomes the play’s most persuasive argument about the rather grand conceit of romance itself. From the outset, the play toys with the notion that the audience will ultimately decide the fate of its central couple. Should they remain together? Should they part ways? Yet perhaps the most compelling moments of this two-hander suggest that such questions are beside the point. Love here ironically cannot be voted o...

Two-Way Glass Productions, an independent production company that seeks to emphasize the ever-shifting relationship between spectator and spectacle, will present Walter Schlinger’s Romeo and Juliet , written and performed by Sean Gordon and directed by Dixie O’Connell. The production will be presented as part of the 2026 New York City Fringe Festival with FRIGID New York at The Rat NYC (68-117 Jay St, Brooklyn, NY 11201) with performances on Fri April 3 at 9:50pm, Sat April 11 at 8:40pm, Mon April 13 at 6:30pm, and Sun April 19 at 2:00 pm.  Former English undergraduate Walter Schlinger stands alone in a wide, infinite, green field. In this meta-theatrical solo performance, Walter reckons with the role our mentors play in our development and attempts to provide insight into the world's most famous love story. While desperately trying to share his work with anyone who will listen, he grapples with the notions of youth, tragedy, and validation. The creative team include...

The Sereys Company will present The Bear , the world-famous, wild and witty one-act by Anton Chekhov, translated by Paul Schmidt, from March 19th through 22nd at 124 Bank Street Theater (120 Bank Street, New York, NY, 10014). Doors open at 7:30pm, and the show starts at 8pm (runtime: 45-50 Minutes) Tickets ($23 and $30) available here . In The Bear , recently widowed Yeléna Popóva has sworn eternal devotion to her late husband, shutting herself away in mourning despite his well-known infidelities. Her rigid grief is interrupted by the abrupt arrival of Grigóry Smírnov, a hot-tempered landowner determined to collect a debt owed by her deceased husband. What begins as a tense financial dispute quickly escalates into a battle of wills between two fiercely proud personalities. The Bear skewers social conventions, exposes the theatrics of grief and masculinity, and proves that love can erupt in the most unlikely circumstances. Ana Radice-Morras plays Yeléna Popóva the faithful and passion...

Moonshiner Written by Lillian Mottern Directed by Danica Selem Presented by Adult Film at a private location in the Ridgewood area, NYC (address released upon RSVP) March 12-April 4, 2026 Annalisa Noel. Photo by Geve. Moonshine, as many theater fans know, is one of the characters in A Midsummer Night's Dream 's play-within-a-play, which is performed by a dreamer-led group hoping to impress its social betters. The young women in Lillian Mottern's play Moonshiner , though hundreds of years and a continent distant from Shakespeare's playacting laborers, share something with them as they engage in aspirational role-playing in a dreamlike setting. For Mottern's characters, that means the unreality-tinged environment of the 2019 Los Angeles wildfires, where moonshine meets firelight meets the Santa Ana winds, which one of the play's women notes, are supposed to (like the moon) "make you go crazy." Adult Film's enthralling production of Moonshiner '...

ExtraO1dinary Aliens! Written by Carolina Ðỗ Directed by Vas Eli Presented by BETTERFLY Productions , Leviathan Lab , and JACK in association with  The Hearth Supported Productions and The Sống Collective  at  JACK 20 Putnam Ave, Brooklyn, NYC March 7-14, 2026 Be it a design flaw or feature, immigration systems have a peculiar talent for turning human lives into scorecards. Carolina Đỗ’s ExtraO1dinary Aliens! , now running at JACK in Brooklyn, seizes that bureaucratic absurdity and stages it as something akin to a cosmic game show. Written as what the playwright calls an “absurd romantic comedy,” the play refracts the contemporary immigration process through satire, sf-fueled defamiliarization, and flashes of real emotional intimacy. Yet in this spirited production, directed by Vas Eli, some of the evening’s most vivid achievements emerge not from the script’s deft conceits, but from the remarkable vitality of the ensemble of performers. From the outset, the production ...

Paul Shearman / The Last Audition Banjo & Bongo Productions, an independent theatre and screen production company dedicated to developing original, character-driven work, will present The Last Audition , written and performed by Paul Shearman and directed by David St John. The production will be presented as part of the 2026 New York City Fringe Festival with FRIGID New York at Chain Theatre Mainstage (312 W 36th St. 4th floor, New York, NY 10018) with performances on Wed April 1 at 7:40 pm, Sun April 5 at 12:20 pm, Thu April 9 at 6 pm, Wed April 15 at 6 pm & The Fri April 17 at 7:40 pm.  Under the glow of a single ghost light, a once-renowned Shakespearean actor rehearses for a final audition for King Lear . As memory falters and reality intrudes, the stage becomes both refuge and reckoning. The Last Audition is a darkly funny, deeply human solo play about identity, legacy, and the quiet, complicated love between those who perform and those who care for them. The creative...