Thinking Theater NYC

Polishing Shakespeare Written by Brian Dykstra Directed by Margarett Perry Presented by Twilight Theatre Co. in association with Kitchen Theatre Company at 59E59 59 East 59th Street, Manhattan, NYC July 10-August 10, 2025 A portion of the Shakespeare industry is devoted to products rooted in the idea that the Bard is just too hard for modern audiences. The No Fear Shakespeare line of books, for instance, promises the original text side-by-side with "modern English translations," despite the fact that Shakespeare's English is already modern English, the early modern and late modern English difference being, linguistically speaking, largely confined to vocabulary. One of the characters in actor, poet, and playwright Brian Dykstra's Polishing Shakespeare is bankrolling a similar project, except focused on theatrical productions, and over a fleet, funny, and fantastic 90 minutes, the show digs into the larger cultural and political implications of such ostensible conce...

Following her critically acclaimed run in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, NYC-based comedian and viral sensation Maria DeCotis brings her darkly funny, musically-driven solo comedy show  Emotionally Unreasonable , directed by Ryan Cunningham (Emmy winner, Broad City , Ziwe )   to Joe's Pub. Have you ever felt threatened when someone shows you their engagement ring? Have you ever been to a wedding and thought, “these people should NOT be getting married?!” Maria DeCotis has too, except she's the one marrying them. Emotionally Unreasonable is an hour of stand-up and musical comedy about her experience as a professional wedding officiant. Expect powerful storytelling, original music, and punchlines you never see coming. She explores power imbalances, femme robots, turning 30, and her unique perspective on legalizing love. Emotionally Unreasonable is a comedic reckoning with survival, told from inside the most romanticized institution we have. The Diddy verdict has proven, once aga...

Jason, Medea & the Tragedy at the PS19 Talent Show Written and performed by Mark Blane Directed by Dante Fuoco Presented at spit&vigor tiny baby blackbox theatre 115 Macdougal St, Manhattan, NYC - Studio 3C June 26-August 28, 2025 The story of Jason and Medea, particularly as recounted in Euripides' play Medea (431 BCE) is, like the oft-adapted Macbeth , a tragic tale of ambition, betrayal, and murder among public figures that seems to invite regular reinvention in the modern era. Political and sexual perfidy in pursuit of social advancement, it turns out—not to mention violent revenge—translate quite well for contemporary audiences. With Jason, Medea & the Tragedy at the PS19 Talent Show , film and theater artist Mark Blane transposes the titular couple to twenty-first century New York City in a lean, captivating solo show that ingeniously reimagines the ancient Greek hero and sorceress as East Village actors. The play is also being adapted into a film, scheduled to ...

 The Broadway Bound Theatre Festival proudly presents the world premiere of Bengal to Berlin , a bold new musical by playwright and scientist Hasan Padamsee, with performances on August 7, 9, and 10 at AMT Theater in Manhattan. The story is poignantly portrayed through the soundscapes of musical theater and Hindustani music in more than 15 songs by Zlaja Miric and choreography in Bengali and Berlin cabaret styles. Directed by Katrin Hilbe, the show weaves together science, identity, and resistance in a way that feels especially resonant today. Bengal to Berlin captures the spirit of Satyen Bose, a brilliant mind forged in the fires of colonial Bengal. Bose is a revolutionary scientist who dares to defy not only British rule but the injustices within his own society. In 1925, against all odds, Bose’s groundbreaking scientific work reaches Albert Einstein in Berlin to form a historic collaboration. In 2025, we mark the 100th anniversary of the fateful meeting. This dynamic ensemble ...

Alice Fishbein. Photo by Caeli Smith It's been 84 years… or 26, since April 1999, when six-year-old Alice Fishbein was finally allowed to watch James Cameron's classic, Titanic , on VHS, and a star was born. Written and performed by  Alice Fishbein , a tour de force in the comedy scene of New York City, and directed by Ryann Lind,  Leo Still Dies in the End is a one-woman parody re-enactment of James Cameron’s Titanic where Alice plays all the roles and the scenes are randomly selected by a prize wheel. Some may call it a sickness, but Alice calls it “nostalgia.” Leo Still Dies in the End is a laugh out loud commentary on how the content we consumed as children affects us as we grow up. The show’s pre-production began in Alice’s parents’ apartment, where a young Alice would mouth the words along to the entire movie. It was soon subsequently banned in the apartment. However, the show concept really formed during a trip to Portugal in 2019 when, during dinners, Alice’s si...

The Tempest Written by William Shakespeare Adapted and directed by Kathy Curtiss Presented by Renaissance Now Theatre & Film at Chain Theatre 312 West 36 Street, Floor 3 & 4, Manhattan, NYC July 2-5, 2025 Carter McEwan, (Mariner), Ethan Freestone (Trinculo), Grace Fillmore (Boatswain), Seth Johnson (Ferdinand). Photo by Jonathan Slaff. The Tempest is one of William Shakespeare's plays most overtly concerned with art and its presentation, making it, in a metatheatrical sense, a particularly apt choice for Renaissance Now Theatre & Film's third season of Shakespearean plays adapted with additions of dialogue in contemporary prose, or "now speak," to highlight themes relevant to contemporary audiences. There exists a long tradition of interpreting sorcerer Prospero's magical "art" as an analogue for theater due to his managing of plot and spectacle throughout The Tempest , and while the "now speak" of this Tempest , courtesy of dire...

Clay Mommy Written by Aviva Pearl Creation Directed by Jael Scott Presented at UNDER St. Marks 94 St. Marks Place, Manhattan, NYC July 1-2, 2025 As a monster, the golem, a humanoid creature in Jewish tradition commonly created from mud or clay and animated via a word written on its forehead or on paper placed into its mouth, destabilizes normative boundaries and categories. A golem occupies the eponymous role of Clay Mommy in Aviva Pearl Creation's play of the same name, adding a complementary supernatural layer to the show's concern with such destabilizations, as well as with self-fashioning and mothering. With an all-trans-femme cast, Clay Mommy presents a nuanced narrative of one young woman's struggles to define and enact what it means for her to be a daughter and granddaughter, a prospective mother, a trans woman, and Jewish after she returns from New York City to the West Coast and her estranged mother. Clay Mommy is part of FRIGID New York's 2025 Queerly Festiv...

King Lear Written by William Shakespeare Directed by Judith Jarosz  Presented by Theater 2020 at The Great Room at A.R.T./New York studios 138 South Oxford Street, Brooklyn, NYC June 12-29, 2025 L to R: Declan Hutcheon as Edgar, David Fuller at King Lear, & David Arthur Bachrach as The Fool. Photo by John Hoffman Power, aging, family dynamics—perennially-relevant topics and ones which Theater 2020’s astutely-acted production of King Lear presents in a fresh and compelling way. With the set comprised of just a few stools, one containing the crown Lear divests himself of during the play’s opening scene, an ever-present reminder of the stakes of this family feud, the production’s versatile, dynamic, talented cast creates a captivating new portrayal of this classic tale’s exploration of the relationship among power, authority, and legitimacy.  David Fuller’s Lear leads the cast with a truly dazzling portray of the titular Lear, fully capturing the character’s capricious...